Duel Masters

Duel Masters

Duel Masters is a Japanese trans-media franchise revolving around a series of television shows, comic books, and the trading card game featured prominently in both. A variety of merchandise is available for all three types of media in the series, including DVDs, comics, video games, and single cards or booster packs to collect.

How do the Japanese manga relate to the English comics?

Dozens of different iterations of the Duel Masters manga are available in Japan; some follow a different season of the anime series fairly faithfully in their content, while others tell their own stories. Since the Japanese Duel Masters manga never came out in the United States, Dreamwave Productions decided to put out a North American comic book series based on the card game. These comics lasted eight issues and told their own story, following many of the same characters seen in the original manga and the first season of the anime. Given that the Japanese and English comics were produced by different people for different audiences, they do not overlap in terms of story, and should be thought of as different continuities.

How many Duel Masters cards are needed for a deck?

All players must have 40 cards in their decks at the beginning of the game. Booster packs were available in English for all of the first 12 sets made, with significantly more available in Japanese. Over the lifespan of the game, a multitude of different kinds of cards have been released for the game. While it is not necessary to have every card, the available cards will be broken down into the following categories:

  • Creatures and Evolution Creatures
  • Cross Gears and Evolution Cross Gears
  • Spells
  • Fortresses
  • Psychic Creatures and Psychic Evolution Creatures
How does the Duel Masters TCG rarity system organize cards?

Each Duel Masters trading card features a symbol in the bottom right corner of the obverse side. These symbols illustrate just how rare and collectible the game piece is. Even base duelist game pieces come with one of the following markings:

  • Circle: Common, a card that makes up the majority of a pack.
  • Diamond: Uncommon, a card that is slightly more difficult to find than a Common.
  • Star: Rare, a somewhat less common type of card and usually considered powerful in the game.
  • Star and Circle: Very rare, significantly hard to find.
  • Four Squares: Super rare, the rarest kind of card that can be found in a pack.
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