About the Duelist:

Hey everyone, my name is JGLP and I'm here to bring you an Introductory Guide to True Dracos. I’ve not been playing this Deck for very long, but it's the only time an Archetype has ever perfectly clicked with my brain, and the only Archetype I’ve ever felt this close of an attachment to very early on, making me build various versions of the Deck to try them out, furthermore the help I’ve gotten from the True Draco channel in the Master Duel Discord server has helped me a lot when it comes to getting up to speed with this Archetype, making me feel comfortable enough to at least present a basic guide to you!

Overview

True Dracos are a very cheap Deck since they require only very few UR to function properly and can potentially even be played without using a single UR card, furthermore they can very well hold themselves against many of the Meta threats, especially in the Ranked ladder. Their overall gamestyle is a Control-heavy one, Tribute Summoning their own Monsters by using Continuous Spells and Traps as Tribute Material, slowly gathering resources via their Monster Effects and slowing the enemy down and then wittling them down turn by turn. Lorewise they’re an Archetype focused on dragon-based fantasy warriors, that is closely related to the "True King", "Dracoslayer" and "Dracoverlord" Archetypes. I'll give an overview of a mostly pure variant as mixing and matching these Archetypes makes them lose a lot of their consistency in the current Meta game, and their gameplay styles drastically diverge, if you want you can attempt a Deck like that on your own time. The variant I'll be explaining also features no Extra Deck, as that brings about a lot of benefits, that are specific to Archetypes like True Draco that Tribute Summon a lot, and that happens to be the most successful version of the Deck, currently.

All True Draco/True King cards always mention both Archetypes in their Effects due to some TCG translation shenanigans, so for the sake of this guide, I will abbreviate all Effects here as just relating to “True Draco” cards, and will give notes whenever this causes problems.

Also do note that True Dracos are absolutely not recommended as a Deck for Beginners, the more you know about the current Meta Decks, the better your chances are to beat them, while this is true for all Decks, it's especially true for Control Decks like True Draco, since we need to know the optimal points to disrupt our opponents to consistently win.

Important Archetypal Monsters

The relevant True Draco Monsters are all high Level Monsters that have the shared Effect of being able to use Continuous Spells/Traps as Tribute Material for a Tribute Summon. The main 3 Monsters of the Deck all require one Tribute and have a shared Quick Effect of being able to search out a card from your Deck if they've been Tribute Summoned, once per turn when your opponent activates a card or Effect. These are soft once per turns, so multiple copies of each card would also mean potentially multiple uses of their Effects.

Dinomight Knight, the True Dracofighter (×3)

Dinomight searches out any True Draco Trap card and lets you either activate it or add it to your hand. He is easily the best Monster in the current version of the Deck, since the True Draco Trap cards are the most powerful of the bunch, and help you out a lot, especially early game.

Ignis Heat, the True Dracowarrior (×2-3)

Ignis does the same thing as Dinomight, but with True Draco Spell cards instead. The Spell cards will help you more the longer the game goes on, so he is very important in the late game. He can be very helpful early on too, as the Spell cards give you access to more draw power and can help add field presence during your turn.