One Piece TCG Decktech: The New Red Ace (OP16)

In today's article, we'll keep exploring OP16 - The Time of Battle, more specifically a red Ace list that got first place at a Japanese tournament in the hands of a player called nokonogato, who won 5 rounds in a row with it. This deck takes a pretty interesting approach to red aggressive strategies. It's a pretty tough Big Mana list centered around giving Rush to its main beaters.

It's time to see how our favorite donut performs in the new OP16 meta.

Portgas.D.Ace OP16-001 is a Whitebeard Pirates red leader with 5000 power and 5 life. His effect activates in the main phase, once per turn, and gives Rush to one of your Monkey.D.Luffy or one of your Whitebeard Pirates, as long as they have 8000 power or more.

This effect tells you everything you need to know about this deck. Ace doesn't draw cards, doesn't nerf cards, and doesn't protect the board by himself. But he turns each big character into an immediate threat as long as they're the right type of character. This means that cards that seem slow at first are actually quite valuable when you play this leader. Your beaters are a lot faster, and this strategy overall is more dynamic. You will get an immediate payoff: you won't have to wait until your characters can attack.

Obviously, Ace has his limits. To make him work, we need to play lots of characters that have 8000 power or more, ways to find them, and ways to make our hand work even though we're playing big cards. So, this list plays searchers, card draw, a reasonable defensive base, and several cards that interact with characters that have 8000 power or more in some way.

The list we'll see today focuses quite heavily on the OP16 kit. Moby Dick OP16-021 and Monkey.D.Garp OP13-016 will set up our hand, while Portgas.D.Ace OP16-118 turns most of our big characters into counters. This is critical because many characters that have 8000 power or more don't come with "Counter" on them. This secret Ace will fix precisely that weakness.

Here it is:

Early Game

Monkey.D.Garp OP13-016 is one of our searchers. It lets us look at the top 4 cards in our deck and get one that costs 3 or more if we're playing Sabo, Ace, or Luffy as our leader. In this deck, this card finds for us exactly what we need in the first few turns, from Monkey.D.Luffy OP16-015 to Edward.Newgate OP16-003, and even the characters with 8000 power or more that we want to put in play to develop our main strategy. Moby Dick OP16-021 is a Stage with an On Play effect that also gets cards for us. Afterward, we can trash it to put a tapped DON!! on our leader or a character.

Ace & Sabo & Luffy OP13-007 is small, but it fits our main game plan really well. It lets us put an active DON!! on our leader or a character, goes to the trash by itself, and also nerfs an enemy character by giving it -3000 power. Considering this deck is full of big bodies, this type of nerf will allow us to use attacks to remove cards in combat and also enables a few effects that take into account the size of each card before they remove it.

8000 Power

Vista OP16-011 is one of the most useful characters in this list. It costs 6, has 8000 power, and, when it enters play, it lets us reveal a card with 8000 power from our hand to draw a card. Afterward, for DON!! x1, when it attacks, we may knock out up to 2 enemy characters with 2000 power or less. Because of our leader, Vista enters play and can attack straight away, draw a card, and also clear any small blockers on our way.

Marco OP16-014 protects one of our characters, specifically from being removed through enemy effects. Instead of that character leaving play, we can just knock out Marco. Furthermore, when it is knocked out, we may discard a character with 8000 power from our hand to bring it back from the trash. It essentially makes this deck resilient against removals, which is critical because this list relies a lot on its big characters, and they must remain in play to enable other effects and cards.

Thatch OP16-005 is the last card in this group. It is a blocker that can enter play for less than it costs originally if we have a Whitebeard Pirates character with 8000 power or more in play. Like so, it is much easier to put in play after we've already put a beater in play, and it is both a great defensive tool and another Rush target for our leader.

Luffy and Ace

Monkey.D.Luffy OP16-015 was made for this leader. His effect triggers if we're playing an Ace leader and if we have 6 DON!! or more in play. If so, it discounts his cost while he is in your hand. When our opponent attacks, Luffy lets us discard a character that has 8000 power or more to set our leader or Luffy himself to 7000 power during that turn. Effects that buff our leader on the opponent's turn are quite fashionable these days and perform really well in this case, particularly considering this list plays lots of 8000-power cards. His effect will always be enabled.

Portgas.D.Ace OP16-118 is the most important card in this deck. While it is in play, all the characters that have 8000 power and are in our hand have Counter +2000. Furthermore, when it enters play or is knocked out, it lets us look at the top 5 cards in our deck and get a Monkey.D.Luffy or a Whitebeard Pirates. This Ace fixes two problems at the same time. He makes our hand more defensive and also finds the next pieces we need.

Time for the Counterattack OP14-018 is quite valuable because of how this list is built. This event gives out Counter +4000 if we have a character with 8000 power or more in play. As this deck was built to put and keep these bodies in play, this condition is very easy to meet. It's an efficient, cheap counter, particularly considering this leader wants to get to the mid and late game with enough resources to play big characters.

The Top of the Curve

Edward.Newgate OP16-003 is one of the main payoff cards in this deck. It gives our leader Double Attack and +2000 power. When it comes in, we may reveal 2 characters with 8000 power from our hand to give an enemy character -6000 power. This will change our approach completely, as it helps us clear the board for attacks and combat.

Edward.Newgate ST15-002 is another big beater that can control the board. When it enters play, it lets us put a tapped DON!! on our leader or a character, and then we can tap it to knock out an enemy character that has 5000 power or less. Considering this deck already nerfs enemy characters with cards like Ace & Sabo & Luffy OP13-007 and Edward.Newgate OP16-003, removing cards with Edward.Newgate ST15-002 will actually be pretty easy, even if they start out quite big.

Roronoa Zoro EB04-007 is the golden standard for red decks nowadays. We can play it even if it doesn't particularly fit the kit we're using. When it enters play, it gives our leader +2000 power until the opponent's next end phase, which will make it quite resilient. Furthermore, if the opponent has a character with 8000 power or more, Zoro will get Rush and be able to attack characters straight away. He'll clear the board and stabilize our main strategy at the same time. It's a 2-for-1 play.

Gol.D.Roger OP09-118, as usual, is an excellent finisher. It has 13000 power and Rush, and its effect wins the game for us on the spot when the opponent activates blocker while any player has 0 life. We don't need to draw it every match, but it is the most perfect late-game threat that red has ever seen. It will prevent the opponent from defending themselves with their board, which is just incredible.

Early on, we must try to be consistent with Monkey.D.Garp OP13-016 and Moby Dick OP16-021. We don't need to rush and attack the opponent's life immediately because we only really start to get threatening when we put our characters with 8000 power or more in play and give them Rush through our leader. Until then, the most important thing is setting up our hand, finding Portgas.D.Ace OP16-118, and making sure we have enough big characters to enable the effects on Vista, Marco, Luffy, and Newgate.

In the mid-game, we'll start using Ace's ability more consistently. Vista OP16-011, Marco OP16-014, and Thatch OP16-005 are big bodies that can attack immediately because of our leader. The secret is picking which character to give Rush to and when really well. We must use the best windows for each attack effect. Oftentimes, removing a body through combat by nerfing cards beforehand will make our strategy work a little better in the following turns. But in some cases, the best play is attacking the enemy leader directly with Luffy as backup to defend ourselves.

In the late game, Edward.Newgate OP16-003 and Gol.D.Roger OP09-118 will change everything. Newgate turns our leader into a real threat with Double Attack, while Roger will end games when the opponent is relying on blockers to survive. This list can also defend itself a lot better than it seems, particularly when Portgas.D.Ace OP16-118 is in play, and the characters in our hand with 8000 power have Counter +2000.

Red decks aren't as appealing to me in One Piece TCG as they are in MTG, but, still, it's interesting to see how different strategies can be born from the idea of an aggressive approach. The deck we saw today is not the best deck in the game, but it can still perform quite well in this wild meta that we've been playing in. It's quite cool to see how new leaders bring different approaches to each color and combination as well.

What do you think? Tell us your thoughts in our comment section below.

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!