Forum:Deck Guide/Gadget

by Gadjiltron

Intro

The Gadgets were a famous set of cards that were popular from the very moment they were introduced. On their own, they were a set of not-very-strong monsters which searched each other out when Summoned, but many players used this to their advantage to create Decks that made it to the tournaments from time to time.

Mechanics

The Gadget family consists of Green Gadget, Red Gadget, and Yellow Gadget. On successfully Normal or Special Summoning any one of them, they will search a different member from the Deck and add it to the hand. Green searches Red, Red searches Yellow, and Yellow searches Green. This allows for the Gadget Deck to have a constant flow of monsters as long as the right colours are still hiding in the Deck, along with thinning the Deck to increase the chances of getting what one needs next. Later additions to the Gadgets added ways to put more bodies on the board, and the advent of Xyz Monsters opened up a new way to use them.

Analysis

Strengths

• Card Advantage - Gadgets are the first known proactive floaters that brought the concept of card advantage to the public eye. Previous similar floaters were Sangan and Witch of the Black Forest but they needed to be put in the GY to trigger. Gadgets do it on Summon, no extra hoops. The original Gadget Deck kept up an endless stream of monsters while backing up their poor stats with removal effects to crush the opponent in advantage.

Weaknesses

• Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring, Droll & Lock Bird - Stop the search and you trip up the Chain.
• Moderate Speed - Going places with Gadgets is reliant on 2-card combos. Guaranteed, half of the 2-card combo is self-replenishing, but this also means you have less room to afford interruption, and bricking hurts harder.
• Low stats - If you end on a Gadget with little else to show for it, I hope your removal suite can compensate!

The Basics

• Green Gadget/Red Gadget/Yellow Gadget - The original trio of monsters that search each other on Summon. Green searches Red, Red searches Yellow, Yellow searches Green. Green is a 1400/600, Red is a chunky 1300/1500, and Yellow is a mediocre 1200/1200. Run 2 to 3 each. Careful of how you Summon them since they can miss the timing!
• Ancient Gear Gadget - A strange cousin to the Gadget family that's designed for something else entirely. You call a card type, and it keeps your opponent from activating that card type when attacking this turn. You can even change this card's name to any other Gadget name, which allows you to combo with Machine Duplication to get a big burst of Gadgets on the board. It's used for niche strategies, but not really core to the Gadget Deck. Up to 3 depending on what you're cooking.
• Gold Gadget/Silver Gadget - Introduced in the DSOD Movie pack, these Gadgets are LIGHT Machines that Summon a LV4 monster from your hand on Summon. If they get destroyed in battle, you get to Summon a Gadget from your Deck! But only one of those effects per turn. Gold is 1700/800, while Silver is 1500/1300, and both are definite 3-ofs if you run them!
• Platinum Gadget - A Link-2 Gadget with 1600 ATK, made with 2 Machine monsters. You can Special Summon a LV4 or lower Machine monster to a Zone this card points to, and if it gets destroyed, you can Special Summon a Gadget from your Deck. Can't be used as Link Material the turn it's Summoned, so you can't easily Link climb with it.
• Boot-Up Soldier - Dread Dynamo - An old Gadget-adjacent monster that has a pitiful 0/2000 statline but gets 2000 ATK when you have any Gadget monster. Now obsolete.
• Boot-Up Admiral - Destroyer Dynamo - Special Summoned by sending 2 Gadget cards from your hand or field to the GY. Beefy 2500/2500 stats, indestructible while you have a Gadget anywhere on the field, and can destroy a card for free each turn. A fairly strong boss monster for the Gadget strategy. Run up to 2.
• Boot-Up Corporal - Command Dynamo - Special Summon from hand by targeting up to 2 Gadgets in your GY and then equipping them to this card. Gains 1000 ATK for each Gadget equipped this way. You usually don't want to pump this to high heavens; all that matters is that this card is a free extender. Run up to 3.

Now, for Spells/Traps:

• Boot-Up Order - Gear Charge - On activation, Special Summon all Gadgets that were equipped to any of your monsters, which ties in with Destroyer or Command Dynamo or Powerhold for a sudden swarm. On top of that, you can discard a card to search Destroyer, making it a very accessible boss monster. Run up to 2.
• Stronghold the Moving Fortress - A strange Trap Monster with a base of 0/2000 DEF, but if you control Red, Yellow, and Green all at once it goes up to 3000 ATK. It's not a very good "boss" monster to rely on, and you have better options for extenders.
• Powerhold the Moving Battery - When you activate this Trap Monster, you equip a Gadget from your Deck or hand to it. It gains twice the ATK of the equipped Gadget. It's a silly sudden beater in a pinch, but suffers from the whole Trap Monster limitations. Run up to 2.
• Boot-Up Order - Gear Force - When anyone attacks and you control Machine monster(s), you get to destroy your opponent's Attack Position monsters up to the Machines you control. It looks like a strictly worse Mirror Force, which only gets a little better when you realize that you can trigger it yourself. But it's still not very good because it's a battle Trap. Avoid.

Associated Monsters

There are several Monsters that are tangentially related to Gadgets, but don't really contribute to the central strategy.

• Ancient Gear Gadjiltron Dragon - A fearsome LV8 3000/2000 that innately holds the Ancient Gear anti-battle-backrow and can be Special Summoned. That was a big deal, though if you Tributed Gadgets to Normal Summon it, it gains more effects. Green gives it piercing, Red and Yellow bestow mild burn. All three bonus effects are largely irrelevant; you're going to Summon it through Geartown's effect.
• Ancient Gear Gadjiltron Chimera - A mediocre LV6 2300/1300 that gains effects if you Tributed a Gadget for it. Green gives it 300 more ATK. Red and Yellow give mild burn. It's basically a vanilla when Special Summoned through any means. No matter what you're doing, don't play it.
• Ancient Gear Hydra - Innate enhanced anti-battle-effect suppression. If you Tribute Summoned it with an Ancient Gear monster, it can banish any monster that survives a battle with any of your Ancient Gear monsters. If you Tribute Summoned it with a Gadget monster, it gets to attack each monster once. Definitely designed to synergize with Ancient Gear Gadget since that one card alone gets you both of its effect.
• Ancient Gear Reactor Dragon - The improved version of Gadjiltron Dragon. Innate anti-battle-effect suppression, destroys an S/T after attacking. If you Tribute Summoned it with an Ancient Gear monster, it gets piercing. But if your Tributed a Gadget for it, you get two attacks with it. The Gadget sub-effect is easily the more powerful of the two, but it's also a potent Geartown payoff. If you're running Ancient Gear bosses, this is easily the best Tribute Summon target.

Also, you've got other miscellaneous cards that don't contribute at all.

• Gadget Driver, Gadget Gamer, Gadget Hauler, Gadget Arms - All of these are Morphtronic support cards!
• Gadget Soldier - It's Machine, it's vanilla, it's an awkward LV6, and doesn't synergize.
• Cyberse Gadget - This isn't even a Machine. It's more of a generic Cyberse card to aid in Cyberse Link climbing.

Example Decks

Pure Gadget

Decklist left intentionally incomplete to showcase the Deck's core. Fill in the empty spaces with cards as you see fit.

Gadget Assembler
Main Deck Monster Cards Green Gadget x3 Red Gadget x3 Yellow Gadget x3 Gold Gadget x3 Silver Gadget x3 Boot-Up Corporal - Command Dynamo x2 Boot-Up Admiral - Destroyer Dynamo x2 Spell Cards Boot-Up Order - Gear Charge x2 Limiter Removal Pot of Avarice Trap Cards Powerhold the Moving Battery x2 Extra Deck Xyz Monsters Gear Gigant X x2 Link Monsters Platinum Gadget x2

Vernus Gadget

"This isn't a Gadget Deck, this is an EARTH Machine combo!" ...Yes, yes it is. Gadgets synergize astoundingly well with the Vernusylph archetype since their unrestricted search refunds on the discard cost to activate the Vernusylph effects. All you need is an EARTH Gadget and a searching Vernusylph in hand and you can explode into an endboard of generic boss monsters. Insert comment bemoaning loss of uniquity here.

1. Discard Gadget to activate Vernusylph of the Flourishing Hills. Search for Vernusylph of the Misting Seedlings and Special Summon the Gadget you discarded. Search with the Gadget.
2. Discard Gadget to activate Seedlings. Search for Vernusylph of the Awakening Forests and Special Summon the Gadget you discarded. Search with Gadget.
3. Discard Gadget to activate Forests. Mill something like Infinitrack Anchor Drill and Special Summon the Gadget you discarded. Search with Gadget.

This leaves you with three Gadgets on board without even using your Normal Summon and you've gone through a fair bit of other setup. Splice with something like the Superheavy Samurai search combo, Symphonic Warrior support, or even a Morphtronic Telefon combo to reach some truly terrifying end boards. Sky's the limit, but watch out for Droll & Lock Bird.

Decklist left intentionally incomplete to showcase the Deck's core. Fill in the empty spaces with cards as you see fit.

Vernus Line

Main Deck Monster Cards Vernusylph of the Flourishing Hills x3 Vernusylph of the Misting Seedlings x3 Vernusylph of the Awakening Forests x2 Vernusylph of the Thawing Mountains x2 Green Gadget x2 Red Gadget x2 Yellow Gadget x2 Infinitrack Anchor Drill Infinitrack Trencher Ancient Gear Box Symphonic Warrior Guitaar Symphonic Warrior Miccs Symphonic Warrior Guitariss Therion "King" Regulus Extra Deck Xyz Monsters Gear Gigant X x2 Number F0: Utopic Future Number F0: Utopic Draco Future Infinitrack River Stormer Link Monsters Ancient Gear Ballista Qliphort Genius Apollousa, Bow of the Goddess

Supplementary Cards

• Infinitrack Anchor Drill - It's LV4 and on Summon, it Special Summons an EARTH Machine (like any of the original 3 Gadgets) from your hand. It's got a decent 1800 ATK for beating. It also level-modulates two monsters at once, opening up your strategies to even generic Rank 8s! If you do include this, add a side of Heavy Forward to make it searchable so that you have a more accessible 2-card combo.
• Machina Fortress + Machina Gearframe - First printed in Machina Mayhem Structure Deck, Fortress used to be a powerful recursive boss monster that can use the Gadgets' searching to fuel its Summons, and Gearframe was its searcher. Though the Machina Gadget build is now a bit obsolete (in favour of EARTH Machine in this day and age), it can serve as an alternate fallback when your Extra Deck plays fall short.
• Kagetokage + Chain Summoning - It's an old combo, but how this works is Chain Link 1 Gadget effect, Chain Link 2 Kagetokage, opening up Chain Summoning at Chain Link 3. It's a 3-card combo that leads to a lot of monsters on the field, opening up a lot of room for Xyz and Link Summons.
• Symphonic Warrior Guitaar + Symphonic Warrior Miccs - Put Guitaar in your Pendulum Zone, discard a card, Special Summon Miccs, and get an uninterruptible second Normal Summon. Get a bunch of bodies on the field without jumping through too many hoops! If you end up with both Guitaar and Miccs in your hand, you can set up a 2-6 Pendulum Summon if you want.
• Therion "King" Regulus - It's easy to get a Gadget in the GY, and you get a big body and an omni-negate. It even synergizes with the Boot-Ups' equipping strat!
• Primathmech Alembertian + Mathmech Circular - Did you know that Alembertian is a generic Rank 4? Did you also know that it can search Circular to eventually go full combo into Accesscode Talker + Update Jammer?
• Clockwork Night - Your Gadgets get a nifty 500/500 boost and the 500/500 reduction on the opponent's end lets them beat over a lot of things they normally couldn't. This card even lets you search for a Gadget while banishing it from the GY. Or if you're in the mood for something thicker, get yourself a Therion "King" Regulus.
• Machina Defense Perimeter - If you control Boot-Up Admiral, not only will a Gadget make it indestructible, Defense Perimeter will defend your Gadgets from targeting. If your opponent still pushes past this and pops a Machine monster, you get to recover one of them like Boot-Up Admiral.
• Omega Judgment - You got Gadgets equipped to things? Say hello to a pseudo-Icarus Attack!