Jun 16, 2010
There are lots of monsters out there that Duelists want to use as often as possible because of their amazing effects that just happen to also have low ATK. For example, Rescue Cat’s effect to Special Summon 2 Level 3 or lower Beast-Type monsters is powerful enough to have an entire Deck built around it, even though Rescue Cat is Limited. Today we’re going to look at a card that lets you use these monsters’ effects more than once, by Special Summoning them from the Graveyard: Damage Gate from The Shining Darkness!
Damage Gate is a Trap Card that can be activated when you take Battle Damage. It lets you Special Summon a monster from your Graveyard whose ATK is less than or equal to the amount of damage you took. So if your opponent attacks you directly with a 1400 ATK monster, you can Special Summon a monster with 1400 ATK or less from your Graveyard.Damage Gate also works when you take damage that isn’t a direct attack, like when a stronger monster destroys a weaker one in battle. Also, Damage Gate activates in the Damage Step, so your opponent can’t destroy your monster with Bottomless Trap Hole orRoyal Oppression.
Damage Gate works best when you want to Summon monsters with low ATK, like Rescue Cator Infernity Necromancer. Since their ATK is quite low, you won’t have to take a big hit to your Life Points to Summon them with Damage Gate. You can even Special Summon monsters in Defense Position, so if your opponent wants to attack with several monsters, you can Special Summon Spirit Reaper to block all of their attacks, or something like XX-Saber Emmersblade to quickly Special Summon monsters from your Deck.
Opponent hits you directly with a monster? Summon your own copy!
Damage Gate can also come in handy if you’re using the same Deck as your opponent. Since you’re both using similar monsters, Damage Gate can let you Summon one of yours whenever your opponent’s copy attacks you directly. Let’s say you’re both using Blackwing Decks. Your opponent destroys your Blackwing Armor Master and Black Whirlwind with Icarus Attack.Next, they attack directly with their Blackwing Armor Master. Since you took Battle Damage, you can activate Damage Gate, and since Blackwing Armor Master has 2500 ATK, you can Special Summon your own Armor Master from your Graveyard!
Damage Gate also works when you attack your opponent’s monsters. Let’s say you’re using an X-Saber Deck and your opponent is playing Blackwings. You Summon XX-Saber Emmersblade and attack a Blackwing – Bora the Spear. Emmersblade is destroyed and you lose 400 Life Points. If you flip Damage Gate now you can Special Summon an XX-Saber Darksoul or XX-Saber Ragigura in your Graveyard or even Rescue Cat if you were lucky enough to draw it already! After this you can Special Summon a monster from your Deck with Emmersblade’s effect. Since you now have 2 “X-Saber” monsters on the field, you can SummonXX-Saber Faultroll from your hand in Main Phase 2 and get another monster with its effect!
Damage Gate is a cool card to use, especially if your Deck has no way of Special Summoning monsters from the Graveyard other than Call of the Haunted. If you want to Special Summon your best monsters back from the Graveyard, give Damage Gate a chance!
