Red Blue Ace has been crushing the OP13 competitive scene, quickly becoming one of the top-performing Leaders in the meta. This Leader is all about outvaluing opponents, having tons of card draw options to fill their hand with cards, and making sure the opposing player can’t easily set up the finishing turn.
With the Whitebeard Pirates and Yamato fighting alongside Ace, this deck will be difficult to beat and will likely remain one of the top performers in the meta! In this guide, we’ll talk about Red Blue Ace‘s strategy, how cards work alongside one another, and other cards you can include in this list depending on your preference.
Leader
Ace is a 6,000 Power Leader with 3 Life cards, having two effects that offer card value and a defensive strategy during your opponent’s turn. Let’s talk about the first effect. During your opponent’s attack, once per turn, you can trash 1 card from your hand to give the opponent’s Leader or one of their Characters a -2,000 Power reduction during the battle. This is a massive defensive effect that lets you protect your Leader or a rested Character by trashing a dead card in your hand that you’ll likely not play on your upcoming turn. This means we can include more cards with no Counter effect than usual, as we’re capable of trashing them to activate our Leader’s effect.
As for Ace’s second effect, if you attach one Don to him, then once per turn, if Leader Ace takes damage or a Character with 6,000 base Power or more is KO’d, you draw 1 card. This is an extremely strong draw engine, and we’ll try to take advantage of it whenever possible. We’ll avoid letting our Leader take damage or losing a 6,000+ Power Character until we can attach a Don to Ace, ensuring his effect is active and we gain a draw when a card is lost.
Decklist
How to Play
Early Searchers
Izo looks at the top 5 cards of your deck to add 1 {Whitebeard Pirates} type card to your hand. This lets you find cards like Marco, Edward.Newgate, or Edward.Newgate to add more consistency to your deck. Izo can later be trashed to filter your hand for better cards, drawing a card, and placing one card from your hand at the bottom of your deck.
Monkey.D.Garp looks at the top 4 cards to add 1 card with a cost of 3 or more to your hand. He’s a more versatile searcher, not bound to a certain card type, which allows you to include cards outside of {Whitebead Pirates} and have a searcher capable of finding them.
Value Plays
Marco is a 4-cost Blocker with 6,000 Power. He can be used offensively to put pressure on the opposing player, but can be kept Active to protect your Leader from an incoming attack. When KO’d Marco draws you two cards, so you get to replinish your hand with more resources, and if you have 1 Don attached to your Leader, you’re drawing an additional card.
Yamato is a 6,000 Power Character with an On Play effect that activates if your Leader is at 3 or less Life cards. Yamato gets to draw you 2 cards and attaches 1 rested Don to your Leader. You’re adding more resources to your hand while adding more Power to your Leader to go for a heavier attack and making sure his effect is Active during the upcoming turn. Having 6,000 Power means if KO’d, Yamato can trigger your Leader’s effect for the card draw.
Charlotte Pudding is perfect if your opponent is holding on to 7 cards or more, forcing them to put all those cards into their deck, shuffle their deck, before drawing 5 cards. This could ruin the opponent’s whole hand and put them behind in the game, making it harder for them to make certain plays or Counter your attacks.
Control Characters
On Play, the 4-cost Atmos lets you reveal 2 Whitebeard Pirates cards in your hand to return a 4-cost Character to the opponent’s hand. This weakens the opponent’s presence on the field and can also be used to remove a Blocker from play.
Jozu lets us return one of our Characters to our hand to return an opponent’s 6-cost or less Character to their hand. So, we’re usually going to return one of our 1-cost Characters, like Otama, Izo, or Monkey D.Garp, to our hand to weaken the opponent’s side of the field, shifting the game in our favor.
Edward Newgate Carry
9-cost Edward.Newgate and Edward.Newgate are your late-game win conditions, both acting as defensive options to weaken the opponent’s upcoming attack turn.
9-cost Newgate gives your Leader a +2,000 Power boost until the end of the opponent’s upcoming turn, making it harder for the opposing player to remove. He’s a great defensive play in the late-game, as you’re turning Ace into an 8,000 Power Leader, effectively shutting down the opponent’s aggression while also going for a heavier swing with Ace. Newgate can later KO a 3,000 Power or less Character when he goes for the attack, which can come in handy to remove a blocker. We can combo him with Thatch to KO a 5,000 Power Character.
As for Edward.Newgate, he’s a 12,000 Power Blocker, acting as a wall to protect you from an opponent’s attack. On top of that, Edward.Newgate is a value play, drawing 2 cards and trashing 1 from hand before attaching 2 rested Don to your Leader and one of your Characters. So, you’re developing a massive blocker, gaining cards in your hand, and going for two heavy attacks to keep aggroing the opposing player, while making sure your Leader’s draw effect remains active.
When choosing between which Newgate to play, you’ll often choose the Blocker if your opponent doesn’t have multiple Characters to attack with. However, if they’ve gone wide on the field, then Edward.Newgate makes more sense to force them into trashing cards to attack with them.
8-cost I Am Whitebeard!! is a key card in this deck, enabling you to cheat out one of your high-cost Edward Newgates a turn earlier than expected. Then, you can give your Leader a +2,000 Power boost that sticks until the end of the opponent’s upcoming turn if you take the top or bottom Life card and add it to your hand.
The decision on whether we want the +2,000 Power boost over the Life card comes down to the state of the game. Do we need a heavier attack to pressure the opponent’s Leader or try to KO a Character? Is the opponent lining up multiple low-power Characters? The +2,000 Power boost can make it harder for those Characters to attack, forcing the opponent to commit more Don attachment over board development.
We’re playing this on Don 8/9 to play our 10-cost Character and the +2,000 Power boost turns Ace into an 8,000 Power Leader to go for a heavier attack and become harder to damage on the upcoming turn. However, we can still play I Am Whitebeard!! when we’re at Don 10, saving 2 Don Active to be used to either play Blocker Uta or Radical Beam.
Late Game Finisher
Gol.D.Roger is a game finisher play, preventing your opponent from activating their blockers if you or they are down to 0 Life cards. He’s the perfect Rush attacker to render the opponent’s blockers useless, forcing them to have the Counter cards needed to survive a Gol.D.Roger attack.
If you or your opponent are down to 0 Life cards, you can play Gol.D.Roger to prevent the opposing player from activating their Blocker keyword, allowing your high-power Newgates to start swinging on the opponent’s Leader and forcing Counter cards from the opposing player.
Events
Gum-Gum Red Roc is an answer for a high-cost Character. You’re placing an opponent’s Character at the bottom of the deck, so KO immunity doesn’t work here.
Radical Beam gives your Leader or one of your Characters a +2,000 Power boost. However, if you’re at 2 Life cards or less, Radical Beam gives +4,000 Power instead, making it your strongest Counter Event to protect you from an attack.
General Tips
- Protect your Life cards. Since we’re playing a 3 Life card Leader, it’s important to protect our Life cards early in the game, especially if we don’t have a Don attached to our Leader.
- Letting your Character get KO’d is worth it. At times, having a Character get KO’d by an opponent’s attack or KO effect is worth it for the card draw you’re gaining, potentially giving you more Counter cards to protect your Leader.
Mulligan Tips
- Going First: Searchers, 5-cost Yamato, I Am Whitebeard!.
- Going Second: Searchers, 4-cost Marco, 6-cost Jozu, I Am Whitebeard!.
Other Cards to Include
- Edward.Newgate only activates if your Leader is at 2 or less Life cards, which isn’t a difficult condition for us to meet. Edward.Newgate puts a condition on all of the opponent’s Characters that are already in play, forcing the player to trash two cards whenever they attack with one of those Characters. This effect can completely prevent your opponent from attacking, either to save their cards or if they don’t have enough cards in hand to trash. If they happen to over-commit by trashing too many cards in hand and end up not closing out the game, they’ll be at risk of losing on the upcoming attack to your attacks. Keep in mind that any newly played Character won’t be affected by Edward.Newgate‘s effect. So, Characters with the Rush keyword can still attack without the opponent being forced to trash 2 cards from their hand.
- The 6-cost Yamato is a 7,000 Power Character with an Activate: Main effect that lets you attach 1 rested Don to your Leader and gives herself the Rush keyword. This means we’re going for two heavy attacks to pressure the opposing player while ensuring our Leader has his draw effect active during our defensive turn. Yamato can still activate her effect on future turns, attaching a rested Don to your Leader to continue going for stronger attacks and keep the Leader effect Active.
- Cavandish is a 6,000 Power Character you can have in play early into the game, drawing you a card whenever he goes for the attack and demanding your opponent remove him.
- Gravity Blade Raging Tiger remains one of the strongest control Events in blue decks, placing two 6-cost or less Characters at the bottom of the deck.
Turn-Based Gameplay
Going First
- Turn 1 (1 Don): 1-cost searcher.
- Turn 2 (3 Don): Searchers.
- Turn 3 (5 Don): 5-cost Yamato, 4-cost Atoms, or 4-cost Marco.
- Turn 4 (7 Don): 6-cost Jozu.
- Turn 5 (9 Don): I Am Whitebeard!!!
- Turn 6 (10 Don): 10-cost Edward Newgate.
Going Second
- Turn 1 (2 Don): 1-cost searcher.
- Turn 2 (4 Don): 4-cost Marco.
- Turn 3 (6 Don): 6-cost Jozu.
- Turn 4 (8 Don): I Am Whitebeard!!!
- Turn 5 (10 Don): 10-cost Edward Newgate.
Closing Words
Red Blue Ace has been crushing the competitive scene. The fact that you have a built-in defensive effect, along with the draw engine, can make things harder for the opposing player to rush you down and set up a winning turn. The Newgates also offer defensive turns, helping you buy time until you’re able to set up the winning turn.
