Overview and History
Trains, officially known as “Railway”, is a series of train-themed EARTH Machine monsters introduced in <span class="gold-shadow">Galactic Overlord</span>. They are piloted by both Anna Kaboom in Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL and Allen Kozuki in Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V. Each card of this series is based on either real life trains or railway infrastructure. Upon its initial release, the deck lacked a proper game plan until the release of <span class="gold-shadow">The Dark Illusion</span> introduced <component id="38"/>, which pushed Trains into a Towers strategy where you'd opt to go first, turbo out Dora, and back her up with a multitude of Trap Cards. At the time, the deck was a large pile of various Level 10s that had little to no synergy with each other. This all changed in 2019 with the release of <span class="gold-shadow">Legendary Duelists: Sisters of the Rose</span>. We not only got a wave of support that synergized well with the existing cards, but also a proper win condition in the form of <component id="39"/>, pivoting the deck from a going-first Towers strategy to a going-second OTK strategy.
About the Author
Hello, my name is <component id="37"/>, the #railway channel Deck Helper. I've been playing Yu-Gi-Oh! ever since I was a kid, and I've always been a bit of a Timmy player: I like big monsters with big ATK and big effects. I enjoy decks that aren't too combo-heavy. I discovered Trains with the release of Dora and fell in love with the archetype ever since.
Strategy and Playstyle
Trains is a blind-second OTK deck, opting to let the opponent go first, and then breaking the opponent’s established board with Kaiju, Lightning Storm, and other going-second staples to open up the path for an OTK using Rank 10 Xyz monsters. Many games end on that very same Turn 2 as you swing for 8000 damage. Railway typically doesn’t run Infinitrack and Machina, and instead sticks to summoning Level 10s to quickly go into our Rank 10 Xyz boss monsters. It shoots for fast games and big numbers, making it easy to pilot. If you’re running Infinitrack and Machina monsters, you might be mistaking your Earth-Machine deck for a Trains deck. A guide for Earth Machine decks can be found here.
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Core Cards
Main Deck
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Night Express Knight
<component id="9"/> The absolute most basic of starters. It does absolutely nothing special aside from being a Level 10 EARTH Machine that you can Normal Summon without tribute, thus letting you use all the other extenders in the deck. There's very little to say about this card in comparison to other cards in this deck. Run 2-3x. </div><div class="column is-12-mobile is-12-tablet is-6-desktop">
Heavy Freight Train Derricrane
<component id="10"/> Where Knight is your most basic starter, Derricrane is your most basic extender. On Normal or Special Summon of any EARTH Machine, once per turn you can Special Summon it from your hand. Its ATK and DEF get cut in half, but that doesn’t matter, it’s being used as either Xyz or Link Material anyway. Derricrane has a very powerful secondary effect: when you detach it for the activation of an Xyz effect, you can destroy a card on the field. Note that this isn’t once per turn, if you detach a Derricrane, pop a card with its effect, then summon another Xyz, and detach a second Derricrane from it, you can pop another card! This effect occurs on a new chain, so if you’re detaching it to activate an effect in response, you won’t get the prompt for it until the current chain is resolved. Don’t worry, you won’t miss timing. The last bit of important nuance to this is that the pop effect activates upon being detached for the activation of an effect. Many Xyz effects detach their Xyz material for cost, so even if your monster has its effects negated, you can still activate its effect to detach Derricrane for cost, have the effect be negated on resolution, and then have Derricrane’s effect trigger to destroy a card! Always run no less than 3x. </div><div class="column is-12-mobile is-12-tablet is-6-desktop">
Super Express Bullet Train
<component id="11"/> Bullet Train is a secondary extender. So long as you control only EARTH Machine monsters (min. 1), you can Special Summon this big boy from your hand for more Xyz and Link Material. This poses obstacles in some situations – If you happen to have something like <component id="40"/> or <component id="41"/> on your field, you will not be able to summon Bullet Train. There are two ways out of this. The first is to use up the non-EARTH Machine cards: Overlaying Jizukiru with something to make one of your Rank 10 EARTH Machines will mean Bullet Train is active again. Ranking up Skypalace into Liebe will do the same. Linking off a card for <component id="42"/> is also a possibility. The second way out is to use Bullet before you start using your non-EARTH Machine cards. If you control a <component id="43"/>, summoning Bullet Train before summoning Jizukiru is a wise idea. Despite these occasional difficulties, the card is more than worth it. It offers some moderate recovery by returning a Machine monster from your GY to your hand during the End Phase the turn Bullet Train hits the GY, and can sometimes be used to attack the opponent in a pinch, provided you have two cards to send to the GY. Run 3x. </div><div class="column is-12-mobile is-12-tablet is-6-desktop">