Damage Calculation – Before and During

por **dracofu** Seg 05 Mar 2012, 20:57

I had been thinking about Bahamut84′s post about Honest and Shrink
for the past few days. There was something odd about the interaction,
but I just couldn’t pinpoint it. It was only upon further research that I
had found the reason.

Although that situation is possible, it is actually a bad play on the Honest player part. To explain why it is a bad play, we shall have a look at the breakdown of the Damage Step:

Substep 2: After Starting the Damage Step

Flip the monster, if it is face-down:

Flip Effects are not activated yet.
Apply the Continuous Effect of the monster, if it has one.
Apply Continuous Effects to the monster (such as effects which
change its Battle Position, like “Gaap the Divine Soldier”, “Level Limit
– Area B”, “Level Limit – Area A”, “Final Attack Orders”, etc.) and
Rule Effects.

Activate effects that activate before Damage Calculation, like “Blast Sphere”, “Drillroid”, and “Reflect Bounder”.
You can activate cards which increase/decrease monsters’ ATK/DEF.
Multiple Chains are allowed during this Substep.

Substep 3: At Damage Calculation

You can activate effects that activate at Damage Calculation, like “Injection Fairy Lily” or “Kinetic Soldier”.
Effects which increase/decrease ATK/DEF CANNOT be activated.

“Honest” is an exception, due to his rulings.

After resolving cards, you move
onwards. Cards cannot be activated in response to the chain. Only one
Chain is allowed during this Substep.
After the chain, apply Continuous Effects like “Skyscraper”, “The Wicked Avatar”, “The Wicked Dreadroot”.

Taken from: Yu-Gi-Oh! Wikia: Breakdown of the Battle Phase

For Substep 2, before Damage Calculation, you are allowed to play
attack/defense modifiers. However that is not the case in Substep 3,
during Damage Calculation, in which you are only allowed to activate
effects that specifically mentioned in their texts (i.e. Honest, Injection Fairy Lily, Psychic Commander).

A smart player would obviously keep his Honest till Substep 3 to play, especially if he is the priority player. Not only will he be able to prevent any Shrink from thwarting his plan, he will deter his opponent from playing an Honest in response. As there is only one chain in Substep 3, any Honest from the opponent will be forced to go into the same chain after his.

In short, keep your Honest till during Damage Calculation before playing it.

Edit: Jason Grabher-Meyer had written a similar article:
9 Out Of 10 SJC Duelists Are Playing Honest Wrong