History StoryBreakerPower / YuGiOh

* The Legendary Dragon cards. The Eye of Timaeus, The Fang of Critias, and The Claw of Hermos could fuse with any monster or trap card to create a new monster or equip spell out of thin air. Suddenly the Fusion Decks of the heroes became thirty feet deep due to the insane versatility offered by these cards, especially since the resulting fusions were often given the exact ability needed to end the duel in their favor. They were used solely to counter the threat of the Orichalos, and left the anime afterwards.

* The Seal of Orichalos from the DOMA FillerArc grants its owner massive advantages over their opponent; 500 ATK points for their monsters, allowing up to 10 monsters on their side using the Spell/Trap Card Zone, this "backrow" of monsters being protected from battle so long as their "frontrow" monsters were alive, couldn't be removed from the field due to magical means[[note]]Though Konami claims this was a lie by Gurimo and no one tried to remove more than once[[/note]], and enabling control over the God Cards without having to be of Egyptian descent. The massive advantages this card gave DOMA forced the heroes to discover new story breaker powers of their own just to ''equal them''.

* Don Thousand in ''ZEXAL'' takes this trope UpToEleven, even by series standards. His Deck makes use of a Field Spell that lets him activate Spells and Traps from his Deck at will, some of which include ''changing what Spell or Monster that an opponent has activated or Summoned''. It also lets his own Xyz Monsters use their effect without needing Xyz Materials, blatantly ignoring the limiting factor inherent in the Xyz Monster design, and with minimal resources, employ a combo that can OneHitKill his opponents. When that's beaten, he switches up to Summoning a monster with ''10,000 ATK'' along with other effects that let him steal the protagonists' monsters for his use. When that is defeated, he gets to Summon a monster with '''[[SerialEscalation 100,000 ATK]]''' that resists destruction and forces the opponent into a MortonsFork of attacking into its ridiculous ATK score or getting an instant loss. It takes the protagonists' own Story Breaker Power to defeat him.

* ''Anime/YuGiOh5Ds'' had Kalin's Dragon ace from the Dark Signers arc; Hundred Eyes Dragon. Summoning it is straightforward (the usual Dark Synchro summon), and it has the same stats as Blue-Eyes White Dragon. However, it's real strength are its two broken effects. Hundred Eyes Dragon lets him gain the effects of ''[[AllYourPowersCombined every]]'' DARK monster in the graveyard. With Kalin's main handless combo strategy resulting in most of his cards being in the graveyard, this makes Hundred Eyes Dragon ridiculously hard to get rid of. And even if it gets destroyed, it lets Kalin choose to ''any'' card from his deck to his hand; no restrictions on what he can get. Understandably, it was severely nerfed for the irl card game.

* The Egyptian God Cards are immune to basically everything except massive brute force. By the end of Battle City, Yugi had obtained all three, and he spent the rest of the series, filler, or spinoffs either getting them stolen or just not drawing them. The only time after the Battle City arc where Atem plays the Gods in a serious match is the Ceremonial Duel, which required a very clever strategy and a lot of very questionable ruling applications.

* The Seal of Orichalos from the DOMA FillerArc grants its owner massive advantages over their opponent; 500 ATK points for their monsters, allowing up to 10 monsters on their side using the Spell/Trap Card Zone, this "backrow" of monsters being protected from battle so long as their "frontrow" monsters were alive, couldn't be removed from the field due to magical means[[note:Though this was a lie by Gurimo and no one tried to remove more than once[[/note]], and enabling control over the God Cards without having to be of Egyptian descent. The massive advantages this card gave DOMA forced the heroes to discover new story breaker powers of their own just to ''equal them''.

* The ArcVillain of DOMA, Dartz, not only has two upgrades to the Seal that push his Life Points through the roof and makes his monsters impervious to Spells and Traps, but he also runs a few strategies that make him nearly invincible. Kyuorta negates all battle damage he takes, and he protects it with several destruction-resistant monsters; when it goes down, it gets replaced with Shunoros, which has stats equal to the massive amounts of damage he's negated and has arms that are [[AlwaysSomeoneBetter always stronger than what they're battling]]. When ''that'' goes down he busts out his final trump card -- A monster with '''infinite''' ATK. Not only did it take the protagonists six episodes to defeat him, Dartz's cards had them on the defensive almost constantly, and it takes a convoluted loop ([[NewPowersAsThePlotDemands and never-seen-before card effects]]) to defeat it.

** Neiru Saionji and his Maximum Monster Yggdrago the Heavenly Emperor Dragon Tree. It can't be destroyed by Traps, can destroy any Level 8 or lower monster once per turn, and change a defensive monster into Attack Position and has 4000 ATK to boot. Note that Rush Duel as a whole is roughly early DM levels of power. And since it's a Maximum, Neiru can drop it basically whenever he wants since his Deck focuses on drawing through his cards and rearranging them until he gets the three pieces of Yggdrago. He beat main protagonist Yuga in their first Duel and it took Yuga's own Maximum to barely scrape out a win as Neiru shuffled his Maximum into his Deck ''twice''. Following this Neiru is generally on the heroes' side, but his account is banned due to the conditions of his and Yuga's Duel so he can't just wreck any opponent they come across. When he finally ''did'' Duel again, he joined Yuga and Roa in the Team Battle Royal and basically swept the competition with Yggdrago until they hit the finals. Gakuto came close to defeating Yggdrago, but was eventually forced to tie with a ''very'' lucky draw. In the second season, when he does Duel again it's on the villains' side.
** Deuteragonist Tatsuhisa "Luke" Kamijo as well. He's easily the best duelist in the show and would probably have been able to defeat any of the ArcVillain characters, and is thus generally relegated to Dueling JokeCharacter Duelists. When he actually ''does'' start dueling the heavy hitters he wipes the floor with them to the point that [[spoiler:Yuo Goha sways Luke to his side after losing to him to turn him against the heroes]] and the first thing he does is wreck [[spoiler:Roa Kirishima]] in a Duel. [[spoiler:Then there's his alter ego The☆Lukeman, who is even ''stronger'' thanks to having Fusion, which was what allowed him to defeat Yuo. The only reason The☆Lukeman himself was eventually defeated was because [[ItMakesSenseInContext a meteor fell from the sky containing a Fusion card that Yuga punched while wearing a Gohanium suit, adding the card to his Deck, and because he didn't mean to really do so, he isn't penalised for breaking the rules]].]]

* The Seal of Orichalos from the DOMA FillerArc grants its owner massive advantages over their opponent; 500 ATK points for their monsters, allowing up to 10 monsters on their side using the Spell/Trap Card Zone, this "backrow" of monsters being protected from battle so long as their "frontrow" monsters were alive, couldn't be removed from the field due to magical means, and enabling control over the God Cards without having to be of Egyptian descent. The massive advantages this card gave DOMA forced the heroes to discover new story breaker powers of their own just to ''equal them''.

* The Legendary Dragon cards. The Eye of Timeas, The Fang of Critias, and The Claw of Hermos could fuse with any monster or trap card to create a new monster or equip spell out of thin air. Suddenly the Fusion Decks of the heroes became thirty feet deep due to the insane versatility offered by these cards, especially since the resulting fusions were often given the exact ability needed to end the duel in their favor. They were used solely to counter the threat of the Orichalos, and left the anime afterwards.

* ''GX'' also has Yubel, a card with 0 attack points, but which cannot be destroyed by battle and any battle damage the controller would take is dealt to the opponent instead. Even if you do get it off the field, that just allows the controller to summon its [[OneWingedAngel even stronger forms]]. Needless to say the real life version was nerfed.
* ''Anime/YuGiOh5Ds'': Zone's Temporal Machine Gods have powerful effects, but are balanced by their need to return to the deck at the end of the turn. Then he plays a series of spell cards that negate that weakness and allow him to summon as many Temporal Machine Gods as he can every turn, and all bets are off.

** [[spoiler:Ai]] in the final season has his ultimate monster, The Arrival Cyberse @Ignister, the only known Link-6 monster. It gains 1000 ATK from the number of monsters used to Summon it, and a further 1000 for every card on the field, so when it's busted out with six monsters, it has 7000 ATK minimum and is regularly above 10000 ATK. It can also selectively become immune to all card effects or just the opponent's for greater versatility and destroy a monster once per turn, then Summon a Token to further power up The Arrival.
** ''VRAINS'' plays with this with Judgement Arrows. Judgement Arrows is a Link Spell, a spell card with Link Markers on it, used by the villains from Season 2 onward. Specifically, it has three markers all pointing upwards, which dramatically helps with Extra Deck summoning (albeit with the condition that like with Link Monsters, it can only be activated in a zone that a link marker points to). It also doubles the attack of any monster it points to when it enters battle. In Speed Duels, the villains have the skill Marker's Portal, which not only allows them to activate the card straight from their deck and give it immunity to negation and destruction. It's a powerful card, but it's not without weaknesses. It's completely vulnerable in Master Duels, and effects that get rid of Judgement Arrows without "destroying" it are always fair game, and when Judgement Arrows leaves the field, all monsters it was linked to are destroyed. To the credit of the Season 2 ArcVillain though, he's smart enough to have counters against any potential play his opponent may make to disable Judgement Arrows.

** Deuteragonist Tatsuhisa "Luke" Kamijo as well. He's easily the best duelist in the show and would probably have been able to defeat any of the ArcVillain characters, and is thus generally relegated to Dueling JokeCharacter Duelists. When he actually ''does'' start dueling the heavy hitters he wipes the floor with them to the point that [[spoiler:Yuo Goha sways Luke to his side after losing to him to turn him against the heroes]] and the first thing he does is wreck [[spoiler:Roa Kirishima]] in a Duel. [[spoiler:Then there's his alter ego The☆Lukeman, who is even ''stronger'' thanks to having Fusion, which was what allowed him to defeat Yuo. The only reason The☆Lukeman himself was eventually defeated was because [[ItMakesSenseInContext a meteor fell from the sky containing a Fusion card that Yuga punched while wearing a Gohanium suit, adding the card to his Deck, and because he didn't mean to really do so, he isn't penalised for breaking the rules]].

* ''GX'' Also has Yubel, a card with 0 attack points, but which cannot be destroyed by battle and any battle damage the controller would take is dealt to the opponent instead. Even if you do get it off the field, that just allows the controller to summon its [[OneWingedAngel even stronger forms]]. Needless to say the real life version was nerfed.
* ''''Anime/YuGiOh5Ds'': Zone's Temporal Machine Gods have powerful effects, but are balanced by their need to return to the deck at the end of the turn. Then he plays a series of spell cards that negate that weakness and allow him to summon as many Temporal Machine Gods as he can every turn, and all bets are off.

* Because all duels start with 4000 Life Points in the anime and manga, Effect Damage becomes a far more powerful option. Dark Bakura is the first person to demonstrate this with his "Just Desserts" Trap Card. In real life, its effect of dealing 500 Effect Damage per monster on the opponent's field wouldn't be worth a second glance, but during the Duelist Kingdom arc, it was one of the most devastating Trap Cards existing thanks to each duel beginning with 2000 Life Points. Dark Yugi almost ''lost'' his first duel with Dark Bakura thanks to one use of "Just Desserts". Notably, Kaiba banned all Effect Damage cards from his Battle City tournament later in the series[[note]]Specifically, just the cards that could be used without cost. His Ring of Destruction and Obelisk the Tormentor cards require sacrificing monsters to deal effect damage[[/note]], and the possessed Joey is given these cards to use freely to get an upper hand in his duel against Yugi. Later series feature monsters with massive burn damage potential that should be able to end the game in an instant, such as Destiny End Dragoon and Dark Strike Fighter, but plot contrivances make it so that they are unable to get their effects off before the opponent defeats them.

* ''Anime/YuGiOhGX'' has Super Fusion/Super Polymerization, a focal point of the third season and gained permanently in the fourth. This little number could fuse together any two monsters, even if the opponent was controlling them, essentially letting the user make their own cards (at the very least, nearly every time it was used, it created a card that made no sense for the owner to have). Every time it was used, it immediately shifted the balance of the duel--and that was just in the game; the card could also fuse together just about anything, including living beings and entire universes. It was only used to fuse something besides cards once, and its user, Judai, spent most of the final season either playing friendly duels that didn't warrant ungodly power or conveniently not drawing it.

* In ''Anime/YuGiOhVRAINS'' main protagonist Yusaku Fujiki/Playmaker's main ace monster is this, and a GameBreaker in the real game that was eventually Forbidden and later received an erratum. Firewall Dragon can return monsters on either field or in the Graveyard to the hand up to the number of monsters co-linked with it, or Special Summon any monster from the player's hand if a monster it points to goes to the Graveyard. The first ability would have been able to wipe almost ''any'' monster off the field with no strings attached, while the second could have enabled Playmaker to swarm the field almost endlessly far sooner than he eventually did. He subsequently only used Firewall Dragon ''five times'' before it was Forbidden in the real game and it stopped appearing in the anime, and when he did use it KryptoniteIsEverywhere tended to be in effect, as four times out of three his field was either to depleted to use it properly or his opponent had an effect to counter it (most notably, main rival Revolver/Varis's Borreload Dragon couldn't be targeted by monster effects). The one time none of that was in play, Playmaker brought Firewall Dragon out against a {{Mook}} and curbstomped him in a single turn.

** ''VRAINS'' plays with this with Judgement Arrows. Judgement Arrows is a Link Spell, a spell card with Link Markers on it, used by the villains from Season 2 onward. Specifically, it has three markers all pointing upwards, which dramatically helps with Extra Deck summoning (albeit with the condition that like with Link Monsters, it can only be activated in a zone that a link marker points to). It also doubles the attack of any monster it points to when it enters battle. And in Speed Duels, the villains have the skill Marker's Portal, which not only allows them to activate the card straight from their deck and give it immunity to negation and destruction. It's a powerful card, but it's not without weaknesses. It's completely vulnerable in Master Duels, and effects that get rid of Judgement Arrows without "destroying" it are always fair game, and when Judgement Arrows leaves the field, all monsters it was linked to are destroyed. To the credit of the Season 2 ArcVillain though, he's smart enough to have counters against any potential play his opponent may make to disable Judgement Arrows.

** Deuteragonist Tatsuhisa "Luke" Kamijo as well. He's easily the best duelist in the show and would probably have been able to defeat any of the ArcVillain characters, and is thus generally relegated to Dueling JokeCharacter Duelists. When he actually ''does'' start dueling the heavy hitters he wipes the floor with them to the point that [[spoiler:Yuo Goha sways Luke to his side after losing to him to turn him against the heroes]] and the first thing he does is wreck [[spoiler:Roa Kirishima]] in a Duel. [[spoiler:And then there's his alter ego The☆Lukeman, who is even ''stronger'' thanks to having Fusion, which was what allowed him to defeat Yuo. The only reason The☆Lukeman himself was eventually defeated was because [[ItMakesSenseInContext a meteor fell from the sky containing a Fusion card that Yuga punched while wearing a Gohanium suit, adding the card to his Deck, and because he didn't mean to really do so, he isn't penalised for breaking the rules]].

** Deuteragonist Tatsuhisa "Luke" Kamijo as well. He's easily the best duelist in the show and would probably have been able to defeat any of the ArcVillain characters, and is thus generally relegated to Dueling JokeCharacter Duelists. When he actually ''does'' start dueling the heavy hitters he wipes the floor with them to the point that [[spoiler:Yuo Goha sways Luke to his side after losing to him to turn him against the heroes]] and the first thing he does is wreck [[spoiler:Roa Kirishima]] in a Duel. [[spoiler:And then there's his alter ego The☆Lukeman, who is even ''stronger'' thanks to having Fusion, which was what allowed him to defeat Yuo]].

* ''VRAINS'' plays with this with Judgement Arrows. Judgement Arrows is a Link Spell, a spell card with Link Markers on it, used by the villains from Season 2 onward. Specifically, it has three markers all pointing upwards, which dramatically helps with Extra Deck summoning (albeit with the condition that like with Link Monsters, it can only be activated in a zone that a link marker points to). It also doubles the attack of any monster it points to when it enters battle. And in Speed Duels, the villains have the skill Marker's Portal, which not only allows them to activate the card straight from their deck and give it immunity to negation and destruction. It's a powerful card, but it's not without weaknesses. It's completely vulnerable in Master Duels, and effects that get rid of Judgement Arrows without "destroying" it are always fair game, and when Judgement Arrows leaves the field, all monsters it was linked to are destroyed. To the credit of the Season 2 ArcVillain though, he's smart enough to have counters against any potential play his opponent may make to disable Judgement Arrows.
* In ''AnimeYuGiOhSEVENS'', ''duelists'' rather than cards come across as this, though their cards do play a big factor.

* ''VRAINS'' plays with this with Judgement Arrows. Judgement Arrows is a Link Spell, a spell card with Link Markers on it, used by the villains from Season 2 onward. Specifically, it has three markers all pointing upwards, which dramatically helps with Extra Deck summoning (albeit with the condition that like with Link Monsters, it can only be activated in a zone that a link marker points to). It also doubles the attack of any monster it points to when it enters battle. And in Speed Duels, the villains have the skill Marker's Portal, which not only allows them to activate the card straight from their deck and give it immunity to negation and destruction. It's a powerful card, but it's not without weaknesses. It's completely vulnerable in Master Duels, and effects that get rid of Judgement Arrows without "destroying" it are always fair game, and when Judgement Arrows leaves the field, all monsters it was linked to are destroyed. To the credit of the Season 2 ArcVillain though, he's smart enough to have counters against any potential play his opponent may make to disable Judgement Arrows.

''Anime/YuGiOh'' has a ''lot'' of such examples, where many opponents faced by our heroes have overwhelming cards which can [[ShapedLikeItself break the story]] if not defeated. Similarly, some of the heroes also possess quite powerful ace-in-the-holes used as a last resort.

* The Virtual World arc introduces a Deck Master mechanic, in which each player picks a monster that can be Summoned to the field at any time, but with the drawback that its controller loses if it is destroyed. The Deck Master also gains a unique ability that can be used at various points in the Duel. Some of the Deck Master abilities are ludicrously overpowered, such as Judge Man, who can destroy all monsters the opponent controls even during their turn. This is offset by the arc villains, the Big 5, mostly being too incompetent at the game to use them to their fullest ability. For instance, Nezbitt's Deck Master, Robotic Knight, has the ability to deal 500 damage for every Machine type monster discarded. As previously mentioned, such burn damage is overpowered in a 4000 LP format (just ask ''[[VideoGame/YuGiOhDuelLinks Duel Links]]'' players who played against similar decks), but he uses it in the most inefficient manner. In a 3 on 1 duel, the best use would be to target a specific player for 1500 damage to take them out one-by-one, but every time he uses it, he instead inflicts 500 damage to all players.

* Pegasus' Millennium Eye allows him to read the minds of anyone he wished, even during a duel. Pegasus used this to read Bandit Keith's mind and humiliate him by asking a child in the audience to play the perfect counter to Keith's move. Pegasus basically couldn't be surprised, ever, by any strategy any opponent came up with because he could read their minds to see it and prepare accordingly. Kaiba countered the powers of the Eye by topdecking without looking at his cards, and Yugi switched minds with Dark Yugi after each played a card to do the same.
* The Egyptian God Cards are immune to basically everything except massive brute force. By the end of Battle City, Yugi had obtained all three, and he spent the rest of the series, filler, or spinoffs either getting them stolen or just not drawing them. He does use them in the series' final battle, which is also noteworthy because one of the Gods, Obelisk the Tormentor, has the ability to sacrifice two monsters to effectively win the game.[[note]]It either gains infinite ATK or destroys all monsters on the field and inflicts 4000 damage, the same as their starting Life Point total.[[/note]] The manga version sidesteps this by simply not letting him get two monsters, but the anime version takes it to ridiculous levels because he summons a whole lot of other monsters as sacrifices for the other two Egyptian God Cards, monsters that could have been used for Obelisk's effect.

* ''Anime/YuGiOhGX'' has Super Fusion, a focal point of the third season and gained permanently in the fourth. This little number could fuse together any two monsters, even if the opponent was controlling them, essentially letting the user make their own cards. Every time it was used, it immediately shifted the balance of the duel - and that was just in the game; the card could also fuse together just about anything, including living beings and entire universes. It was only used to fuse something besides cards once, and its user, Judai, spent most of the final season either playing friendly duels that didn't warrant ungodly power or conveniently not drawing it.
* ''Anime/YuGiOhZEXAL'' has the Shining Draw ability possessed by the protagonist Yuma Tsukumo when fused with Astral, which allows him to create any ZEXAL Weapon he wants... and later, any card he wants. Every ZEXAL Weapon conveniently possesses [[NewPowersAsThePlotDemands exactly the correct abilities to win the current duel,]] and they can be alarmingly complex - presumably, the only reason Yuma doesn't just declare that the cards he creates with Shining Draw automatically win the Duel is out of fairness. Add in the fact that Yuma's deck is very OTK-friendly, and Yuma spends much of the second series either out of commission or unable to fuse with Astral just so that every single episode didn't become "summon Hope, Shining Draw, win."

* The Egyptian God Cards are immune to basically everything except massive brute force. By the end of Battle City, Yugi had obtained all three, and he spent the rest of the series, filler, or spinoffs either getting them stolen or just not drawing them.

* ''Anime/YuGiOhVRAINS'' has roughly one per FinalBoss of the season.

* Because all duels start with 4000 Life Points in the anime and manga, Effect Damage becomes a far more powerful option. Dark Bakura is the first person to demonstrate this with his "Just Desserts" Trap Card. In real life, its effect of dealing 500 Effect Damage per monster on the opponent's field wouldn't be worth a second glance, but during the Duelist Kingdom arc, it was one of the most devastating Trap Cards existing thanks to each duel beginning with 2000 Life Points. Dark Yugi almost ''lost'' his first duel with Dark Bakura thanks to one use of "Just Desserts". Notably, Kaiba banned all Effect Damage cards from his Battle City tournament later in the series[[note]]Specifically, just the cards that could be used without cost. His Ring of Destruction and Obelisk the Tormentor cards require sacrificing monsters to deal effect damage[[/note]], and the possessed Joey is given these cards to use freely to get an upper hand in his duel against Yugi.

* ''Anime/YuGiOhVRAINS'' plays with this with Judgement Arrows. Judgement Arrows is a Link Spell, a spell card with Link Markers on it, used by the villains from Season 2 onward. Specifically, it has three markers all pointing upwards, which dramatically helps with Extra Deck summoning (albeit with the condition that like with Link Monsters, it can only be activated in a zone that a link marker points to). It also doubles the attack of any monster it points to when it enters battle. And in Speed Duels, the villains have the skill Marker's Portal, which not only allows them to activate the card straight from their deck and give it immunity to negation and destruction. It's a powerful card, but it's not without weaknesses. It's completely vulnerable in Master Duels, and effects that get rid of Judgement Arrows without "destroying" it are always fair game, and when Judgement Arrows leaves the field, all monsters it was linked to are destroyed. To the credit of the Season 2 ArcVillain though, he's smart enough have counters against any potential play his opponent may make to disable Judgement Arrows.

* Pegasus' Toon World can turn regular monster cards into "Toon" type monsters that are impervious to battle destruction, and can hide inside Toon World on Pegasus' turn to become totally impervious to all harm. Much like the Blue-Eyes White Dragon above, Pegasus never released Toon World to the general public because every duelist having an army of [[ToonPhysics Bugs Bunnies and Daffy Ducks]] would be a disaster for game balance, [[ScrewTheRulesIMakeThem but he kept it for himself anyway]]. When Kaiba and Yugi dueled Pegasus, they had to come up with creative ways to destroy the Toons instead of relying on brute force. Toon World became less powerful after the Duelist Kingdom arc ended and the anime updated the card's rules to match its real-life counterparts (i.e. No turning every monster you want into a Toon, and Toons weren't [[NighInvulnerability Nigh-Invulnerable]] anymore).

** [[spoiler:Ai]] in the final season has his ultimate monster, The Arrival Cyberse @Ignister, the only known Link-6 monster. It gains 1000 ATK from the number of monsters used to Summon it, and a further 1000 for every card on the field, so when it's busted out with six monsters, it has 7000 ATK minimum and is regularly above 10000 ATK. It can also selectively become immune to all card effects or just the opponent's for greater versatility and destroy a monster once per turn, then Summon a Token to further power up The Arrival.

* One that is a literal GameBreaker, is Golden Castle of Stromberg. It cannot be destroyed, and forces your opponent to attack every turn... and any monster he attacks with is IMMEDIATELY destroyed, and the opponent takes damage. Furthermore, your opponent has to sacrifice half his deck every round. It's so powerful... because it was intended as a single-release promo and illegal for play in-universe. The villain of the arc hacked the systems to recognize this card as legal and also to add more effects to create an even bigger advantage for his representative.[[note]]What is inferred from commentary is that the cost of giving up half the Deck was supposed to apply to the ''user'' of the card, not the opponent, and that the destruction invulnerability was also absent on the original version of the card.[[/note]] [[spoiler: Yugi defeats it anyway, because he's THAT darn good, by virtue of having only 1 card left, which means [[ExactWords he cannot remove half his deck.]] Cue the Castle exploding.]]

* Don Thousand in ''ZEXAL'' takes this trope UpToEleven, even by series standards. His Deck makes use of a Field Spell that lets him activate Spells and Traps from his Deck at will, some of which include ''changing what Spell or Monster that an opponent has activated or Summoned''. It also lets his own Xyz Monsters use their effect without needing Xyz Materials, blatantly ignoring the limiting factor inherent in the Xyz Monster design, and with minimal resources, employ a combo that can OneHitKill his opponents. When that's beaten, he switches up to Summoning a monster with ''10,000 ATK'' along with other effects that let him steal the protagonists' monsters for his use. And when that is defeated, he gets to Summon a monster with '''[[SerialEscalation 100,000 ATK]]''' that resists destruction and forces the opponent into a MortonsFork of attacking into its ridiculous ATK score or getting an instant loss. It takes the protagonists' own Story Breaker Power to defeat him.
* [[spoiler:Zarc]] from ''Anime/YuGiOhArcV'' runs a deck designed to be a MasterOfAll with the four Summon methods, focused on summoning his ace monster and uses cards with various interlocking defensive effects that make it [[NighInvulnerability very difficult to get rid of]]. His main Pendulum cards also have never-before-seen scales of 0 and 13 to allow him to Pendulum Summon anything. On top of that, it also is capable of summoning upgraded, corrupted versions of all 4 Dimensional Dragons consistently ''on the opponent's turns'', and even has the ability to destroy cards added to the hand outside the Draw Phase, rendering Action Cards and tutoring moot. And even if by some miracle you manage to destroy it, it's a Pendulum Monster, so he can use his aforementioned Pendulum scales to summon it again. Unlike other instances of this trope with regards to past ''Yu-Gi-Oh!'' villains, his PurposelyOverpowered cards serve to illustrate [[spoiler:Zarc's]] fear of losing, something that the rest of the cast begin to call him out on. In the end, it takes four cards specifically designed to be his AchillesHeel [[spoiler:and Yuya deliberately sabotaging Zarc for the last blow]] in order to finally take him down.