One Piece TCG: OP14 - The Azure Sea's Seven Review (Leaders!)

Leaders are always the first thing the One Piece TCG community wants to see when a new set comes out. Not only because we always get one or two popular characters as new leaders, but also because most sets use the anime or manga as a base when it comes to deck identities.

OP14 - The Azure Sea's Seven is pretty straightforward, as it centers around the Shichibukai. This particular group of characters has been a part of One Piece since the very beginning. Their powers and identities were revealed throughout the story bit by bit, which encouraged curious fans to create their own theories about them.

OP14 includes seven Leaders, each one representing a classic Shichibukai member, except for Kuma, who was replaced by Trafalgar Law. We usually get less Leaders, but getting more of them just means we'll have a little more variety. Particularly considering soon all the Leaders from the first block in the game will rotate out.

In this article, we'll go through each of the seven new leaders in this set and show you what each brings to us in terms of game plans, deckbuilding, and relevance in the meta.

Trafalgar Law OP14-001 is a red Slash The Seven Warlords of the Sea/Supernova/Heart Pirates leader with 5 life and 5000 power. His ability swaps the base powers of two characters until the end of the turn, but they need to be Supernova or Heart Pirate characters.

Considering you'll use this ability on your turn, and it will last until the end of the turn, it is not a combat trick but more a way to time your attacks and trades well. The most obvious strategy is to first use a Rush attacker with a lot of base power, like Trafalgar Law OP14-009, and then swap its power with a low-cost character that is already in play and attack again. However, in the next turn, you can be sure the low-power character will become an easy target.

Unfortunately, Trafalgar Law OP14-001 is not performing well in Japan overall, and will most likely fail in the West as well. This Leader struggles a lot against Starve and can't build a valuable board like the other meta decks can. Still, this is a fun, cheap, unusual strategy. It will be perfect for beginners or off-meta tournaments.

Dracule Mihawk OP14-020 is a green leader with 5 life and 5000 power that becomes even bigger against Slash opponents, which is quite accurate considering his title in the story: the strongest swordsman in the world. If Mihawk is up against a Slash opponent, he has 6000 power, which naturally makes him more resilient against certain counters and the most common attacks.

What really defines this Leader, however, is his second text box. Once per turn, you may tap 1 card and, if there is a character in play that costs 5 or more, you may set up to 3 DON!! as ready. Obviously, you won't be able to play characters after you use this ability, so try to do that before you do.

In practice, this will be your final action in a turn. Like so, you'll have DON!! to attack after you use all your resources on expensive characters like Donquixote Doflamingo OP04-031 and other actions that require DON!!. Furthermore, though you'll have to tap a card, many cards in this list will trigger an effect when you tap them. I see Dracule Mihawk OP14-020 as a patient, reactive green list that develops the board in a turn and controls the opponent the next. The buff against Slash opponents is an extra that will make many of them obsolete, like Roronoa Zoro OP12-020, which was quite dominant in the last meta.

In the Japanese meta, which is a great preview for the Western meta, Mihawk is one of the most dominant decks nowadays. He has performed really well in big tournaments, and could be just as successful in the West real soon.

Jinbe OP14-040 is a blue Leader with 5 life and 5000 power. His main ability lets you move DON!! you've already used in a very simple way. Once during your turn, you may discard a card from your hand to attach up to 2 tapped DON!! to your Leader or a Fish-Man/Merfolk character. Like so, you'll virtually have 12 DON!! in a turn to work with.

Honestly, Jinbe OP14-040 is a bit odd, as he doesn't feature the blue mechanics we're all used to. He is a bit more aggressive. The fact he forces you to discard a card is also noteworthy. Considering in One Piece TCG any cards in your hand are a defensive resource, Jinbe will need a deck that can set up and hold on to decent hands more than usual. In exchange, he'll give you something aggressive decks usually don't: the opportunity to use more DON!! in more elaborate plays, and not compromise all your resources at once.

He'll need a certain type of card, which points to a certain type of deckbuilding, and this leads us to another detail. Considering his effect pushes us to a Fish-Man/Merfolk core, we'll desperately need a second color, more specifically green, as then we'll be able to use cards like Jinbe OP11-031.

Fortunately, the blue cards in this set include good bodies for their curve and characters that benefit from this Leader's extra DON!!. However, we'll still have to look at other Fish-Man/Merfolk cards, like Arlong P-048, which has disappeared a bit lately.

Jinbe OP14-040 can wreak havoc in smaller tournaments if well-played. It is an unusual strategy for blue, but I'm sure I'll have a lot of fun writing a deck tech around it.

Boa Hancock OP14-041 is a Special Kuja Pirates/Seven Warlords blue/yellow Leader with 4 Life and 5000 power. She has performed well in Japanese tournaments and has two abilities. The first one rewards you for playing characters on the opponent's turn with a new card, and turns life triggers and some reactive effects into board advantage. The most interesting detail is that you can use this effect more than once per turn.

Her second ability is the most important one. Once per turn, if she has a DON!! attached and one of your Amazon Lily or Kuja Pirates characters with over 5000 base power is knocked out, you may remove a card from the opponent's life pile and put it in their hand. This effect is quite straightforward as well as quite direct. It will benefit from the large boards this deck can build and eventually punish your opponent for trying to react.

This deck will defend itself well, create large boards, and also disable some life triggers, all while most likely drawing cards precisely as it fills the board when it takes damage. This Leader and Dracule Mihawk OP14-020 are some of the best Leaders in this set.

Donquixote Doflamingo OP14-060 is a Special Seven Warlords of the Sea/Donquixote Pirates purple leader with 5 life and 5000 power. His ability lets you, once per turn and when your opponent attacks, return a DON!! to your deck. Then, you may pick between your Leader or a Donquixote Pirates character and redirect the enemy attack to that card.

In practice, this turns all your characters into potential blockers. Your opponent won't be able to choose which character they want to attack. Meanwhile, you'll be able to protect an engine or important character, or simply not take any damage yourself from an attack you usually wouldn't be able to block. Please note, also, that though this mechanic is very similar to how blockers work, you may redirect attacks to tapped characters.

Many of the small characters in this archetype have On K.O. effects precisely because you should redirect attacks to them. For instance, when Baby 5 OP14-072 is knocked out, you may use 1 DON!! to heal 1 life. Considering there are many different ways to use this ability, and you'll have to use it just right, Donquixote Doflamingo OP14-060 is a bit difficult to master. But he is worth it because he's very fun.

Crocodile OP14-079 is the most difficult Leader in this set. He is a Special Seven Warlords of the Sea/Baroque Works black leader with 5 life and 5000 power. His first effect already dictates how we must build him and changes how black works in One Piece TCG as a color: you can't use effects to remove enemy characters from play.

His other ability, which you can activate once per turn in your main phase, shows you the alternative path you must follow with him. It states that you may K.O. one of your Baroque Works characters to give -10 cost to an enemy character during that turn, as well as mill 2 cards from your own deck. So, a deck with this leader must play cards that interact with your graveyard, namely how big it is and which cards are in it, like Miss Doublefinger(Zala) OP14-086. It also must play cards that interact with 0-cost enemy cards, like Miss Wednesday OP14-083.

As you won't be able to play effects that remove enemy units, sturdy boards will become a problem quite fast. So, this deck should play Crocodile OP14-120, which prevents enemy characters from attacking and can also come back into play after it goes to the graveyard. This deck will also center around getting ahead through small power struggles so that you can set up your game plan throughout each turn. It will be as difficult to pilot as Donquixote Doflamingo OP14-060, but just as fun.

The last Leader in this set, Gecko Moria OP14-080 is a Special Seven Warlords of the Sea/Thriller Bark Pirates black/yellow Leader with 4 life and 5000 power. You can activate his first ability once per turn in your main phase and K.O. one of your Thriller Bark Pirates characters to give +1000 to your Leader and all your characters that turn. It's a respectable global buff that will make your characters a lot more resilient and create value from wide boards. The only drawback is that you have to sacrifice a unit to use it, but you probably will already want to sacrifice those units anyway to trigger other effects.

His second ability is more reactive and difficult to use. When this Leader attacks, you may discard 3 cards from your hand to put the top card in your deck in your life pile and heal. It's a straightforward way to make the game last a little bit longer, but three cards is a lot, even in a deck like this, which can reuse resources in the trash pretty well.

Gecko Moria OP14-080 works in primarily two ways. He will always buff other characters, converting characters you can sacrifice stress-free into power, and force your opponents to spend more counters or give up some of their own characters. At other times, you may use him to trade your hand for time.

Finally, please note that the Thriller Bark Pirates kit in this set has become a pretty fun way to play yellow and has become popular in many yellow builds.

The funniest part about all of this is that this set doesn't include the original Shichibukai. For some reason, Trafalgar Law OP14-001 replaced Kuma, who was part of the original group. Not even EB04, the set centered around Kuma's flashback story, gave us this leader, which is quite puzzling.

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

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!