Tucker

Paul Tucker (known as Pyro Tucker, or just Tucker) is a character from Legendhiro's Yu-Gi-Oh! DF. He is a member of the Duel Force, and the main character John's best friend. Tucker is often childish and typically acts without thinking. Like John, Tucker is in good physical shape. Where John is skilled at martial arts, Tucker is an expert at street fighting.

Tucker is a Fire Duelist. His favorite/Spirit monster is Mr. Volcano, a monster that he says reminds him of himself.

Before the Duel Force
Tucker grew up with his abusive and neglectful father. His father's poverty led them to live in a dangerous area, and after awhile Tucker joined a street gang as an excuse to spend time away from home. With Tucker absent, his father abandoned his abusive ways and started taking his severe emotional depression on himself by drinking and gambling. It because clear quickly that he didn't care one bit for Tucker. This made things worse. Tucker stopped caring about anyhing, including school and his gang-related activities. He simply went through the motions. It wasn't until years later, when John stood up to Tuckers gang-mates, that Tucker snapped out of his own depression. He fought his former gang-mates alongside John, and the two have been best friends since. John taught Tucker how to play Duel Monsters, remarking that Tucker is hotheaded, but has great skill underneath. Tucker still lives with his father, in the basement of the house they share. He and his father mostly ignore each other.

Personality/Mannerisms
Tucker is known for being someone who acts before he thinks, often missing key details in various situations. He is facinated with the appearance and power of fire, and he always carries a lighter. He eats a lot of junk food, and is known to mooch off of his friends from time to time. This is odd, since he usually refuses the help of his friends in serious situations, when he really needs their help. He is very proud, and when he makes himself focus, he has a mind as formidable as any other great strategist. Tucker is quite possibly the most determined of the Duel Force.

Story
Tucker is often the comic relief character. He says and does stupid things often, because he rarely thinks things through. Technically speaking, if one were to follow the labeling method used by most fans of Yu-Gi-Oh!, Tucker would be the "Jonouchi" of Yu-Gi-Oh! DF, while John would be the "Yugi", and Max would be the "Kaiba".

Gather the Duel Force
Tucker is the second member of the four person team that John puts together for a Team Duel. This is the team that will become the Duel Force. Tucker duels Jason and Mike of Team Beatdown, defeating the former and losing against the latter. Later, Tucker duels first against Pegasus' Duel Robot, against a deck based on the one used by Katsuya Jonouchi in the Yu-Gi-Oh! Duelist anime. He defeats it, proving that his fighting spirit and determination can overcome good luck.

Tucker is the most sceptical of Pegasus' warnings. He only agrees to go along with the Duel Force's mission because he trusts John's decision. It isn't until Karen, Monty and Lawrence attack the Duel Force at the airport. When Tucker sees the magical powers of the Order, he comes to believe that what Pegasus said is true. Also, after Jen and Tucker are defeated by Lawrence, Tucker becomes fiercely determined to defeat Lawrence.

While in Egypt, it is Tucker's obnoxious behavior that attracts the attention of Odion, who eventually agrees to guide the Duel Force to the Burial of the Souls. Tucker is also the one who defeats football-player-turned-Duelist Robert, winning a large amount of Duel Monsters cards that the Duel Force uses to upgrade their decks. Tucker also realizes during the first story arch hat monster effects can be even more important than power. This leads him to create a new strategy that ends with him summoning his Soul Monster, the Legendary Flame Lord, against Lawrence's Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon. Legendary Flame Lord defeats the Ultimate Dragon and leads to Jen and Tucker winning the duel.

Reign of the Reaper
Tucker, alongside Jen, is one of the first Duel Force members to duel (and be defeated by) Max. He also is the one to suggest that Rocky Stone might be one of the Duelists chosen by the Duelist's Souls. Tucker faces Rocky in a local tournament, using the opportunity to find out if Rocky has a Soul. The Duel is never shown, but it is implied that Tucker loses.

Tucker and John defend Rocky when he is attacked by a group of Order thugs, and he is the one to free John's kidnapped mother from her bonds.

The Dark Duel Force
Tucker helps Karen and Max with forming a strategy that he and Sarah can use to defeat the mighty team of War Ruler and Guardian Ruler. He is instrumental in the defeat of War Ruler, and after Sarah is defeated, Tucker defeats Guardian Ruler almost entirely on his own. Tucker, his energy spent, goes on to face Archfiend Ruler. He is weak and finds himself barely able to lift his arms. He is unable to duel at his best, and is defeated.

Terror of Blackheart
Tucker faces Guardian Ruler one-on-one in the woods of Duelist Kingdom. He defeats Guardian Ruler easily, proving how much better he has become. Tucker also contributes his power to Hiro in order to help him regain his original form of the Legendary Duelist in time to battle Blackheart.

Kaiba Corp Invitational Tournament
Tucker duels in the first round against the Professional Duelist Dr. William Crabtree. Despite Crabtree's assessment that Tucker is weak and worthless, Tucker wins the duel and exposes a fraud sceme of Crabtree's to the public. In the second round, Tucker duels Christopher Johnson in an attempt to make it into the semi-final round and face John. He is defeated when Christopher is able to counter his Ring of Destruction/Barrel Behind the Door combo. Tucker vows to fight John in a "real duel" one day.

Special #2: The Looming Threat
Tucker is one of the Duel Force members instrumental in holding back the Dark Divine Dragon until John can arrive to defeat it.

The Great Duel Force Tournament
Tucker defeats Lawrence and Max in the first and scond rounds, and moves on to finally face John. He and John clash, there strategies more or less equal. The duel comes down to John's The Fiend Megacyber against Tucker's Legendary Flame Lord. Tucker uses the effect of his monster, but John saves The Fiend Megacyber with the effect of Interdimensional Matter Transporter and combines the attack of Megacyber with the attacks of monsters summoned using Return from the Different Dimension to overpower Tucker and defeat him.

The Soul of Fire
Soul Quality: Determination

Soul Monster: Legendary Flame Lord

Tucker's Soul gives the wielder the power to summon and manipulate fire. The more determined the wielder becomes, the stronger the flames, and the greater the control. Tucker's Soul gives him incredible but dangerous power, even outside of a duel, but that power leaves him very weak.

Deck
Tucker's deck was originally based on powering up Fire monsters. Even though his later decks still use Fire monsters, the focuses of Tucker's later decks are often to deal fire-themed effect damage, essentially giving Tucker the ability to fight alongside his monsters.

Gather the Duel Force - Reign of the Reaper
This is the earliest verison of Tucker's fire deck shown in Yu-Gi-Oh! DF. It uses some burn cards, but its primary strategy revolves around summon powerful Fire monsters quickly and often times increasing their power.

The Dark Duel Force
This version of Tucker's deck is designed strategically, containing cards that are never seen again, such as Essence of Fire (an original card) and Magician of Faith. This deck was probably specifically built to take on the Dark Duel Force, and was also very likely the inspiration for every deck that Tucker has used since.

Terror of Blackheart - Kaiba Corp Invitational Tournament
This is the first version of Tucker's final deck. This version uses the Asmodian (Fire Attribute, Fiend-Type) monsters in addition to Tucker's several Pyro and Dragon monsters. Even though they are never shown, it should be assumed that this deck does contain Incandescent Ordeal and Legendary Flame Lord.

The Great Duel Force Tournament
Though very similar to the previous deck, this deck is only considered a different deck because it makes use of addtional Pyro monsters instead of the Fiend-Type Asmodians, since running so many non-Pyro monsters actually slows the deck down considerably. Assume that any card from the previous deck that is not shown here, save the Abaki or Flame Ogre, is in this deck as well.

Trivia

 * According to the author, Tucker goes on to become a firefighter.
 * Tucker is very clearly one of the author's favorite characters. He has put more thought into Tucker than almost any other character.
 * If Karen, Max, Tucker and John, as they appeared at the end of Yu-Gi-Oh! DF, were to duel against each other, all at once, their power would be equal. The outcome of the duel would be left to chance.