Tribute

"Sacrifice" redirects here. For the card known as "Sacrifice" in the OCG, see "Relinquished".

Tribute, known as Release in the OCG and the Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's anime and as Sacrifice in the Yu-Gi-Oh! and Yu-Gi-Oh! GX animes, is usually a way of voluntarily sending a card from your side of the field to the Graveyard, often used to activate a card effect or perform a Summon. When you Tribute a card it is not considered destroyed. Some examples include:

• Monsters being Tributed for a Tribute Summon.
• "Exiled Force" Tributing itself in order to activate its effect to destroy one monster on the field.
• Ritual Monsters requiring their corresponding Ritual Spell Card and a Tribute of Monster Cards whose total Level is greater than or equal to the Level of the Ritual Monster in order for it to be summoned to the field.

• Celestia,LightswornAngelLODT-EN-UR-1E.png

  A monster that requires a Tribute to Summon.

• ExiledForce5DS1-EN-C-1E.png

  Exiled Force

• HamburgerRecipeMRL-EN-C.jpg

  An example of a Ritual Spell Card that requires a total amount of Level star monster(s) to be Summoned onto the field

Unless the card specifically states that you can Tribute your opponent's monsters like "Soul Exchange" or "Lava Golem", a player can only Tribute monsters on their side of the field.

When Tributing for a card effect, the Tribute(s) are considered Costs, which means players cannot respond to the Tributes with card effects, since paying a Cost has no Spell Speed. This also means that Tributes occur before the activation of the effect that they are being Tributed for.

While Tributing a monster for a Tribute Summon is not technically considered a Cost, the Tributed monster still leaves the field before a player can respond to the action.

Cards which involved Tributing formerly worded it as "offer as a Tribute" as "Tributing" and "Tributed" are not actually words. This practice was eventually stopped.