Write every effect that activates in this order: the condition, a colon, the cost or targeting, a semicolon, then what happens. That is Problem-Solving Card Text (PSCT), the format Konami has used on TCG cards since July 2011, and its own summary is three words long: CONDITIONS : ACTIVATION ; RESOLUTION. Raigeki Break has no condition, so it starts at the second part:
Discard 1 card, then target 1 card on the field; destroy it.
The joining words, the once per turn sentence and the word "When" are where custom cards stop doing what you meant. Every rule below is checked against Konami’s seven PSCT articles and Yugipedia, and every quoted text is a real card.
What the colon and semicolon mean
Text before the colon says when, or how often, the effect can be activated. Text between the colon and the semicolon is what you do the moment you activate it: pay, discard, Tribute, detach, target. Text after the semicolon waits until the Chain resolves. So a cost is paid even if the effect gets negated, and a condition only has to be true at activation. If something must still be true at resolution, Konami adds a separate sentence, as on Zombie Master: "This monster must be face-up on the field to activate and to resolve this effect."
The punctuation also tells players whether a Chain starts. Konami’s rule from Part 3: a colon or semicolon means the effect starts a Chain, and neither means it doesn’t and can’t be chained to. Dark Magician Girl’s ATK boost has neither, so it just applies.
Spells and Traps are the exception that confuses people. Activating the card always starts a Chain, so Pot of Greed is correctly written as "Draw 2 cards." with no punctuation at all.
Target, it and that target
An effect targets only if it says "target", and the word goes before the semicolon because targets are chosen at activation. Monster Reborn: "Target 1 monster in either GY; Special Summon it." Leave the word out and it’s a different card. Accesscode Talker’s "destroy 1 card your opponent controls" picks its card at resolution, which gets around anything that can’t be targeted.
When a cost and a target share the activation text, the cost comes first and "then" joins them: "Discard 1 card, then target 1 card on the field".
After the semicolon, how you refer back to the target changes the ruling. "That target" (Mystical Space Typhoon: "destroy that target") means it must still match the targeting requirements at resolution. "It" or "them" means the requirements only mattered when you targeted. "Both" means all the targets must still be valid or nothing happens.
Then, and if you do, also, and
When an effect does two things, the joining word answers two questions: do they happen at the same time, and does one depend on the other? Konami set this out in Part 7 of the series (December 12, 2012). "Also, after that" arrived on cards in 2014.
| Wording | Timing | If part of it can’t happen |
|---|---|---|
| Do A, then do B | B after A | No A means no B. A still happens without B. |
| Do A, and if you do, do B | Same time | No A means no B. A still happens without B. |
| Do A, also do B | Same time | Do whichever you can. |
| Do A, also, after that, do B | B after A | Do whichever you can. |
| Do A and B | Same time | Both or nothing. |
My advice: default to "and if you do". Konami calls plain "and" rare now, kept for all-or-nothing effects. "Then" has a side effect most custom card writers don’t intend. Because B becomes the last thing that happened, nobody can respond to A with a "When" effect. Soul Taker reads "destroy that target, then your opponent gains 1000 LP", and that LP gain is why a monster destroyed by it can’t use a "When this card is sent to the GY: You can" effect.
Once per turn, soft and hard
Players call the two versions soft and hard (not Konami’s words). Soft goes before the colon. Barrel Dragon: "Once per turn: You can target 1 monster your opponent controls; ..." It limits that one copy while it stays face-up where it is. A second copy can use its own effect, and a copy that leaves the field and comes back can go again.
Hard is a separate sentence at the end that names the card. Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring: "You can only use this effect of "Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring" once per turn." Now you get one use per turn across every copy. The verb matters too. "Use" means a negated activation still counts as your one. "Activate" lets you try again if the activation was negated. With two effects, write "each effect of" instead, as Salamangreat Gazelle does.
I think any custom effect that searches, draws or Special Summons should be hard once per turn. Soft is fine on a boss monster you’ll only ever have one of.
If or when, and (Quick Effect)
An optional effect written "When... : You can" has to be activated right after its trigger, so the trigger must be the last thing that happened. Fail that and it "misses the timing", a phrase Konami’s own Part 6 uses. "If... : You can" has no such problem. Compare two clowns:
Peten the Dark Clown: When this card is sent to the GY: You can banish this card from your GY; Special Summon 1 "Peten the Dark Clown" from your hand or Deck.
Performage Trick Clown: If this card is sent to the GY: You can target 1 "Performage" monster in your GY; ...
Tribute Peten for a Tribute Summon, or lose it in the middle of a Chain, and its effect is gone. Trick Clown always works. Mandatory effects (no "You can") never miss. So write "If" for triggers. Keep "When" for effects that respond directly to something, like Sakuretsu Armor’s "When an opponent’s monster declares an attack:".
A monster effect usable on either player’s turn needs "(Quick Effect)" right before the colon, the marker used on prints from July 2017 onward. It can follow a condition, as on Ash Blossom ("When a card or effect is activated that includes any of these effects (Quick Effect): You can discard this card; negate that effect."), or stand alone, as on Aleister the Invoker: "(Quick Effect): You can send this card from your hand to the GY, then target 1 Fusion Monster you control; ..." Without it, a monster effect that has no trigger is an Ignition Effect, your Main Phase only. Quick-Play Spells and Traps don’t take the marker.
Material lines and built-in Summons
Extra Deck monsters open with their materials on a line of their own, with no period, then a line break before the effects. In our card maker that means typing the materials first and pressing Enter.
| Type | Real example | Card |
|---|---|---|
| Fusion, named | "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" + "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" + "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" | Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon |
| Fusion, generic | 1 "HERO" monster + 1 WATER monster | Elemental HERO Absolute Zero |
| Synchro | 1 Tuner + 1+ non-Tuner monsters | Stardust Dragon |
| Xyz | 2 Level 4 monsters | Number 39: Utopia |
| Link | 2+ Effect Monsters | Decode Talker |
A monster that Special Summons itself without starting a Chain uses a comma where the colon would be, and puts where it comes from in parentheses. Cyber Dragon: "If only your opponent controls a monster, you can Special Summon this card (from your hand)." Konami’s Part 5 treats those parentheses as the sign of a built-in Summon. Write the same idea as "If only your opponent controls a monster: You can Special Summon this card from your hand." and you’ve made a Trigger Effect that starts a Chain.
Names, capitals and abbreviations
Card names and archetype names go in double quotes: 1 "HERO" monster, "Polymerization". Attributes are all caps (WATER, DARK). Types have dropped the "-Type" suffix, so it’s "Zombie monster". Game terms are capitalised (Special Summon, Tribute, Set, Deck, Main Phase, Level). Verbs like destroy, banish, target and draw are not. The first word after a colon is capitalised; after a semicolon it isn’t.
Current cards say GY (not Graveyard), LP (not Life Points), ATK/DEF, and Spell/Trap. "Card" survives when the text is about activating the card itself: Solemn Judgment still says "a Spell/Trap Card is activated". Write "banish", never "remove from play".
Six templates you can copy
These are my own wordings, built from the cards quoted above. Swap the bracketed parts for your names. The random card generator also rolls an invented card you can open in the maker and rewrite.
| Pattern | Text |
|---|---|
| Removal with a cost, on your turn | Once per turn: You can discard 1 card, then target 1 card your opponent controls; destroy it. |
| Search when Summoned | If this card is Normal or Special Summoned: You can add 1 "[Archetype]" monster from your Deck to your hand, except "[Card Name]". You can only use this effect of "[Card Name]" once per turn. |
| Revive when sent to the GY | If this card is sent to the GY: You can target 1 "[Archetype]" monster in your GY, except "[Card Name]"; Special Summon it. You can only use this effect of "[Card Name]" once per turn. |
| Negate from the hand | When your opponent activates a monster effect (Quick Effect): You can discard this card; negate that effect. You can only use this effect of "[Card Name]" once per turn. |
| Summon itself, no Chain | If you control no monsters, you can Special Summon this card (from your hand). You can only Special Summon "[Card Name]" once per turn this way. |
| Battle Trap | When an opponent’s monster declares an attack: Target the attacking monster; negate the attack, and if you do, banish it. |
What goes wrong
Effects that can never activate
The usual culprit is "When... : You can" on something that is almost never the last thing to happen. A monster used as Synchro Material goes to the GY first and the Summon happens after, so "When this card is sent to the GY: You can draw 1 card" never works off being used as material. A card discarded as a cost has the same problem, because the cost is paid before the effect resolves. Changing one word to "If" fixes both.
Ambiguous targeting
"Choose 1 monster and destroy it" or "destroy 1 monster" reads fine until someone asks whether it targets. As written, it doesn’t. If you meant it to, the sentence is "Target 1 monster your opponent controls; destroy it." Say whose monster, too. "On the field" includes your own.
A wall of text that won’t fit
Our maker justifies the text, squeezes it sideways, then steps down through smaller sizes the way printed cards do. There’s a floor. The box takes 1,200 characters, and at the smallest size a monster has room for 10 lines and a Spell or Trap for 13. Past that the end is cut off. Long before that it’s hard to read on a printed 59 × 86 mm card. If you’re near the limit, ask whether the third effect belongs on a second card.
Checklist before you export
- Every effect that should start a Chain has a colon or a semicolon, and no Continuous Effect has one.
- Costs and the word "target" sit before the semicolon.
- Optional triggers start with "If".
- Either-turn monster effects say "(Quick Effect)" before the colon.
- Anything that searches or Summons ends with "You can only use this effect of "[Card Name]" once per turn."
- Names are in quotes, and it says GY, LP and Spell/Trap.
- Extra Deck monsters start with a material line.
Custom cards are for casual games: Konami’s tournament policy doesn’t allow proxy or counterfeit cards in Sanctioned or Official events, and this site isn’t affiliated with Konami. When the text holds up, you can print a sheet of nine from the custom cards page. For anything not covered here, Konami’s PSCT series on yugioh-card.com is still the reference, though its examples say "Graveyard" and "Life Points" because they date from 2011 and 2012.