Following Starter Deck: Link Strike, Structure Deck: Cyberse Link takes Playmaker’s strategy to the next level. Decode Talker has been recoded into an alternate form, swapping his sword for a shield and becoming a real team player!

Encode Talker is a LINK-3 monster with 2300 ATK and requires 2+ Cyberse monsters as its Link Materials. While it lacks the continuous ATK boosting effect of Decode Talker, Encode Talker can become far larger than any monster your opponent can throw out by teaming up with a monster that it points to. Once per turn, if your monster that Encode Talker points to battles an opponent’s monster with higher ATK, you can make your monster unable to be destroyed and you take no damage for that battle! That would be a pretty standard defensive effect on its own, but there’s an extra bonus you get for using it: after damage calculation, Encode Talker or a monster it points to, gains ATK equal to the ATK of the opponent’s monster that just battled until the end of the turn!

Encode Talker is all about defending your monsters to make an opening so you can swing the tides of battle. There are a couple different ways you can use the effect of Encode Talker. The first is when your opponent is trying to make an aggressive push, Encode Talker makes it easy to defend one monster by battle and then beef up whatever else might need some help for later. This makes correct zone placement very important with Encode Talker, because its effect can only help out the monsters it points to. Note that Encode Talker’s Link Arrows are asymmetric: it points down and down-right unlike Decode Talker’s down-left and down-right arrows. If you’re playing a Link Monster-heavy strategy and you want to expand as far as possible, that means you’ll want Encode Talker in the left-hand Extra Monster zone.

The other way you can use Encode Talker is as part of a “team attack” with the monsters it points to. Monsters attack individually and use their own ATK, but if you attack an opponent’s monster with your weaker monster, you can protect it with Encode Talker and then hand Encode Talker a huge ATK boost allowing it to take out the larger monster. It is much better to utilize this offensive tactic before going on defense, that way you get multiple uses out of Encode Talker. Knowing when to switch between an offensive and defensive role is what will let you master cards like Encode Talker so you can best incorporate them into your strategy!

You can find Encode Talker and other powerful Link and Cyberse monsters in Structure Deck: Cyberse Link  on November 3!