Exodia The Forbidden One is among the strongest card combos in all of Yu-Gi-Oh! as a result of assembling all 5 items in your hand robotically wins you the sport, however pulling off such a feat isn’t really easy at a aggressive event. That’s why the group went wild final weekend on the Yu-Gi-Oh! Championship Collection (YCS) Indianapolis 2023 when participant Jeffrey Leonard pulled it off not as soon as however twice on a streamed function match.
![The stuff of legend. (Image from Official Yu-Gi-Oh! TRADING CARD GAME YouTube stream.)](https://sm.ign.com/ign_in/photo/e/exodia-obl/exodia-obliterates-yu-gi-oh-tournament-feature-match-with-un_4jd5.jpg)
Leonard began the event with a powerful 3-0 document piloting his Exodia Dracoslayer FTK (First Flip Kill) deck. Exodia is, after all, beloved by Yu-Gi-Oh! followers as a result of it’s how Yugi Moto gained his first duel towards Seto Kaiba within the first episode of the Yu-Gi-Oh! Anime (“Exodia, OBLITERATE!”), however it’s thought of one of many worst FTK decks within the aggressive scene. Basically, you both win the coin flip to go first and pop off with an prolonged combo that allows you to summon Exodia in a single flip, hoping and praying that your opponent doesn’t have a method to counter it, otherwise you lose. This YCS was a significant event with virtually 2000 duelists competing, so Leonard profitable three matches in a row with Exodia received him observed and placed on digicam for the fourth spherical of the event.
The match was a better of three contest, so Leonard must pull off his Exodia combo twice to take the win. He was paired towards veteran participant and former Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG champion Justin Singh, who was piloting the Tier-1 Tearlament deck, so he had his work minimize out for him. The primary sport noticed Leonard get off to a rocky begin, with Singh making an attempt to interrupt his combo early on, however Leonard was nonetheless capable of string collectively the mandatory items to summon Exodia, inflicting the group to erupt with applause and cheers.
Leonard is a pleasant, acquainted face within the Yu-Gi-Oh! neighborhood. He’s a 55 year-old participant from Florida who received into the sport so he may play along with his son, Jason, and he earned a little bit of a popularity for making nice event runs with Mystic Mine Burn. Speaking to Yu-Gi-Oh! YouTuber Cimo after the event, Leonard defined that when the Yu-Gi-Oh! Grasp Duel ban listing made his favourite deck unplayable, he feared the identical would occur within the TCG, so he sought out a brand new deck with FTK potential and, with some assist from his son, he ultimately landed on Exodia.
Within the second sport of Leonard’s function match, Singh went first and received off to such a powerful begin that Leonard merely conceded the sport on his first flip, permitting him to go first within the closing sport.
Issues didn’t look good at first within the third sport, with Leonard solely taking part in down a number of playing cards and passing the flip to Singh. Nonetheless, Singh didn’t have any performs to make, save for setting one card facedown and passing the flip to Leonard. Screams and clapping could possibly be heard off-screen, as the group knew this meant Leonard had one other likelihood to summon the large man. Leonard drew what he wanted to get his combo going, permitting him to repeatedly use the impact of Blue Dragon Summoner to look out Exodia items from his deck. The group started chanting, “Jeffrey! Jeffrey! Jeffrey!”
With 4 items in-hand, the group switched to, “Another piece! Another piece!” till Leonard executed the final transfer of his combo and added the fifth and closing piece of Exodia to his hand, profitable the match in spectacular fashion. The viewers went nuts, and Leonard was grinning ear-to-ear. Even his opponent couldn’t assist however giggle and smile as he shook Leonard’s hand on the finish of the match.
“This deck will not be for profitable tournaments. It’s principally to have enjoyable and summon Exodia, and it will possibly positively try this,” Leonard informed Cimo.
The information of Leonard’s unlikely Exodia win unfold like wildfire throughout social media, with Yu-Gi-Oh! followers celebrating the sheer awesomeness of what he pulled off.
“JEFF TAKES EXODIA TO REMAIN UNDEFEATED TO 4-0 AT THE YU-GI-OH CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES TODAY! When Justin set 1 handed and the group exploded it was wild,” @House_of_Champs posted on X.
@galzoTCG mentioned, “Jeff Leonard profitable a YCS function match with Exodia will not be what I had on my bingo card this week! F***ing genius man, unbelievable second in time.”
“Jeff Leonard profitable this function match with Pendulum Exodia is now the best Yugioh stream second of all time,” declared @skyhawksings.
Sadly, Leonard’s win streak ended quickly after, and by the top of the event he wound up putting 591st out of 1,957 gamers. Canadian participant Steven Santoli ended up profitable the YCS along with his Rescue-ACE deck.
The final time Exodia made an enormous splash on the aggressive scene was over a decade in the past when Jarel Winston piloted an Exodia Stall deck to a Prime 8 end on the 2012 Yu-Gi-Oh! World Championships.
Leonard’s unlikely win with Exodia is a reminder that although the sport has been round since 1999, and there is a lot at stake at huge tournaments like these, there’s nonetheless loads of enjoyable available with the Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG.