Hello all and welcome back to a Main Set portion of Preview Season where the cards never stop flowing. Bandai is doing something slightly different this time around. We still get the mass release of cards on Friday, but they’ve been showing off cards every day since Monday allowing a bit of contemplation as time goes on. This week we have Red and Yellow. The Return of Baby. Beerus getting another shot at a Leader. Yet another Goku Leader and lastly, Bulma getting a Leader before Tien. As before with a Main Set, I’ll be grouping cards with their Leader/Archetype where I can to make things a bit easier. That being said we have a lot of ground to cover so let’s get started.

Beerus/Beerus, Furious Strike

We’re gonna start off with the Leaders that have the least direct support. Or in this case, almost zero support (though I’m gonna put all his named card with him for cleanliness). Beerus is your all-consuming generic Leader, in this case for Red/Yellow. Him being Red over Yellow being a big deal as that allows him a greater amount of useful cards that require a Red Leader. His Front Side ability is essentially Hirudegarn but arguably better since he doesn’t require a swing at a Leader (or a swing at all for that matter). He can sit there digging as he pleases and of course the very useful Untap 2 Awaken which usually precedes a bunch of shenanigans.

This is where he stops being relatively cut and paste. While his Awakened Side abilities are still quite simple and generic, he is built differently than most. For one, and this will be a theme apparently, he doesn’t just come with the guaranteed Draw 1 on his Awakened Side which is a big deal. However Bandai has shown as of late how to really balance Leaders around that fact to allow them to maintain effectiveness and this should be no different. Beerus gains card advantage in other ways. A quick and dirty KO whenever he needs it for 2 Energy is very potent. You won’t always use it or need to use it, but it’s absolutely great to have and can free up deck space for other avenues. His other ability just allows essentially a free 10K Combo every turn, which also sets up Arrival which is fantastic. As we’ve seen in the past few months, Arrival (and Arrival like effects) are much more potent when you can trigger them with less energy. Not having an upfront cost to even trigger the Arrival (either through Energy or losing 2 cards) will make any Red/Yellow (or really any Arrival in the colors though you’ll probably stick to Red/Yellow for obvious reasons) Arrival very strong. I expect Beerus to see play as long as Red/Yellow is at least decent.

Beerus, Biding His Time

I mean yeah, we’ll take it. 1 Drop 15K Critical is still pretty damn good. The only downside is that you can’t actually play him Turn 1 but it’s a small price to pay for strict power and card efficiency especially in the late game. Not too worried about the field restriction because…well not having it would make this card busted and this will likely be a priority kill in some capacity.

Beerus Ball

Now this…is tricky to evaluate. This is a new cycle of Counters for this set, somewhat similar to the “free” Negates from a couple of sets ago. Just Counter:Play instead but also, and this is a big distinction, only working if you’re at 4 or less life. This makes the “free” aspect much worse (a lot tougher to be willing to give up a Life when you’re on the razor’s edge of death to begin with) and also makes the card just a simple brick early in the game.

What you get for all of this is a Denial of Hope along with a Senzu Bean. But a much weaker Denial of Hope, especially considering by the time you can actually use this card to begin with the opponent will start dropping much bigger Battle Cards. I feel Bandai thinks the cheap Energy Cost will offset everything else, or were just worried by the potential power level but ultimately this card likely fall short. Better things to use.

Whis, the Spectator

The Check Land for Red/Yellow. His unique skill is to negate the skills of an opponent’s Battle Card for the turn. It’s okay, decent in very niche situations but you’re not really playing this to play it on board. Check Lands still great.

Beerus, No Holds Barred

Probably the only card in this set I’d really card legitimate Beerus support and even then…it’s just a good generic card that Beerus can work with a bit better due to his Awakened side. This card is just very powerful on its own merits. 2 Energy for a 25K that either kills something or locks down a Battle or Leader Card. Very versatile on both turns, very devastating at the right points. Obviously great in Beerus since Arrival can basically come on any turn. But any Red/Yellow deck probably wants a few copies of this in the deck to fill it out as he’s almost never bad. Just a great card in general.

Son Goku & Pan/SS4 Son Goku, Senses Regained

Whew boy, next in the line of “All or Nothing Alpha Strike” Leaders we have this. It’s pretty clear, it wants you to win by Turn 3 or no later than Turn 4. You drain a bunch of life as your card advantage AND can only Awaken at 2 (up until this set a trait only shared by Zamasu who basically could tank an extra 4-6 damage on his Awakened Side anyway)…but you get Double Strike for days and a Super Awaken ability (Draw 2 and Untap 2 together).

This Leader doesn’t seem particularly great though because of how incredibly precise your turns need to go. Being at an odd amount of life is extremely finicky as it will cost you your ability to untap Goku when you Awaken and running more Self-Awaken cards seems absurdly risky. Not to mention this all gets really ruined by well placed defensive cards. I don’t see a huge future for this Leader outside of fun builds.

SS3 Son Goku, Ever-Evolving

An interesting hybrid between your typical 1 Drop Cantrip and a 1 Drop Archetype Searcher. His upside is far greater allowing you potential access to both, and possibly repeated searches. The downside though is you don’t get access to the search right away unless you put in the extra energy. If you really need to find a GT Goku or Pan you’re not gonna be immensely happy paying 2 Energy to potentially whiff if you don’t have him established already. Still it’s a minor inconvenience and I feel the upside warrants its inclusion if a Red/Yellow GT Deck is a thing.

Great Ape Son Goku, Abilities Amplified

At its surface it’s a one time, one energy 35K Attacker. In theory that would absolutely see play. However requiring a very specific Evolve target hurts and it’s just a big vanilla otherwise. He does have a use to his existence though, and that is…

SS4 Son Goku, a Heartfelt Plea

Say hello to the cornerpiece of the SS4 Goku Alpha Strike deck. Or at least that’s the intention. The flow is simple enough, get into the above Goku by Evolving (or by just simply making a Red Goku big enough) and then punish hard with this to try and win the game. The thing is, the above Leader has so much going against it that having such specific pieces to gather at the VERY specific time of Awakening is probably too much to handle.

Instead this probably just finds a home in Set 3 Pan instead. It’s child’s play to get a 25K Battle Card in her deck and to Awaken into this for free would likely be a very terrifying experience for the opponent staring down a 35K Triple Striker that also likely drew Pan 3 cards. If you can get the colors to work, just playing this on 5 in there is plenty strong as well for similar reasons. Regardless, I don’t think this card is a build around but rather a card that really wants to fit in something that can already hum on its own.

Pan, Great Ape Whisperer

…I’m assuming Bandai knew what kind of power that untapping a Battle Card with very little condition could do so they threw every restriction they could think of on this card. Again, meant to work with the above stuff to piece together a hilariously convoluted Alpha Strike turn that loses to a bunch of different cards. She’s a vanilla blocker outside of the one time she gets an Untap, and you can’t play her for free outside of a very specific time.

The thing is she still could’ve seen usage…if Promo Movie Broly didn’t already exist. Because of him I find it hard to believe she’ll get much in the way of meaningful play.

Bulma/Bulma, Familial Bonds

Another in the “really, THEY got a Leader?!” group we have Bulma. Unsurprisingly she gets a reduced base power for both her sides which usually means increased defensive options to make up for it and she is no exception. Giving all your Red and Yellow Saiyans and Earthlings Blocker is insane. Just simple things like cantrips become increasingly difficult for the opponent to play around alongside any card that gets value from being in battle or getting killed becoming much better. Add to that her ability to draw without being attacked, her Awakened side drawing 2 for free with no restriction and an Untap 2 Awaken definitely presents a high ceiling for Bulma. Obviously the lower power is worrisome if we ever end up in a very aggressive format but in a slow format she’s essentially all gas. Immense potential for Bulma.

Son Goten, Rushing In

Probably the most obvious card to use with Bulma outside of Saiyan/Earthling cantrips. Under her he becomes a 1 Drop Revenge Blocker which is really still absurd. The fact that the opponent will have to likely expend resources to get this off the board gets value on its own because if they don’t he just sits there controlling the game for very little commitment. Fantastic for Bulma.

Videl, Miraculous Aide

Super Saiyan Videl! Well kinda, but still it’s close enough! She’s all about recycling your key cards which is pretty good. More abuse of the above Goten, or getting back very valuable early pieces for later. Not a 4-of most likely but she should be decent enough to find a couple of slots in any Bulma deck.

Bulma, Unyielding Courage

Now talk about a high ceiling for the future. This card at its base level, already pretty good. 1 Drop Earthling Cantrip which as mentioned is already great in Bulma decks but then she allows you to get back 1 Drop Saiyans while milling yourself. Now, the downside is that she negates them for the turn so the goal is to find Red and/or Yellow Saiyans that have continuous abilities or the like and there aren’t that many at 1. The main target will likely just be Goten which will present an extreme headache for an opponent who doesn’t out this card. Other than that, not a ton of good targets. Mainly Suicide Attackers and Rushing Warrior Pan for even more draw power. But still, this is a card that only ever trends upwards so I’d invest into her.

Pilaf, the Cunning : Trunks, the Cunning

These are technically miscellaneous cards, but as they’re both Earthlings and/or Saiyans they might as well go here. It’s a new cycle of cards that once again want to crack down on excessive Energy Untap. In this case forcing an excess cost of 5 Drop Area cards to the Warp in order to do so. Do note though that this goes for “Turn Player” which means you’re under this restriction as well. The upside to these cards though, compared to the original cycle which was one-sided, is that this ability persists the rest of the game regardless of whether these cards are on the field or not. The ceiling is worse, as getting rid of an energy outright is often better than just a maintenance cost but the floor is a lot better so I can actually see these guys getting play.

Birth of a Super Saiyan God

In Bandai’s never ending quest to make retrains of A Child’s Wish, we have this card. Notably it’s a lot less restrictive in a few areas compared to Familial Bonds. No Leader Restriction, can get Red or Yellow Earthlings as well as Saiyans, no Power Restriction as well. This time though they capped it off at 2 CMC cards not unlike Assembling the Squad. Also allows a Mill 2 which is nice, though as we’ve seen not as nice as just grabbing 3 Dragon Balls. There will be some specific game to this card as we’ll see in a moment but as a generic card Familial Bonds is probably still better unless you want to run other Leaders.

Birthday Party

So yeah, you know what Bulma really wanted? A free, repeatable every single turn at no cost, Faithless Looting. Now…Looting isn’t nearly as busted in this game as it is in MTG because DBS doesn’t have nearly the disgusting Graveyard strategies and the ones it does have Bulma can’t really use all that effectively so that’s nice. But regardless this is just supreme card selection and Drop Area loading on a free card. And it even allows you to jam 4 because you can just pitch excess copies at the end of the turn because no one really plays Field disruption. Card is potentially bonkers (though not Hogaak bonkers thankfully), another card that only trends upwards.

Son Goku, the Path to Godhood

So all of this sporadic mill and Drop Area loading had to be going somewhere right? Well here it is. The goal is obvious, get all the Super Saiyan God pieces in place, play this and then go to town. Before we dive into the actual target, we do have to talk about how this one plays out regardless. Thankfully, it grabs from Deck or Hand so you aren’t drawing dead by drawing all the SRs. Now you do need to essentially grab 6 different characters and have 5 of them in the Drop already (or 6, since this is where Birth comes into play over Familial Bonds). Obviously the hope is between the draw power of Bulma and Birthday Party that you’ll get into those cards really fast but we’ll see. On top of that both this and the SR can get countered which is troublesome. The question is are all the hoops worth it for the Double Strike/Dual Attack? I’ll say this. If you’re going to play a majority of those characters anyway (and in Red/Yellow you WILL be playing the SR as you’ll see soon) then it probably doesn’t hurt to tech the rest of these pieces in for the explosive turn. I don’t think you build around the play though due to how vulnerable it is to disruption. So in other words, depends on your build but I don’t think you start with this card. You put this in near the end if you see you have most of the pieces anyway.

Son Goku, Dawn of Divinity

It’s been a while since we got a high rarity card that was essentially just Keywords but here we are. 3 Drop 20K Critical is already above curve which is good, but then it comes with Offering making him a very aggressive play. This is early enough to where the opponent may actually consider taking the Crit hit over letting you Draw 2. This is just a very efficient card. It’s actually for the best it’s not 15K otherwise Familial Bonds would just be snapped and a half with this card. When you think about this card, in most ways it’s an improved Burst Attack Son Gohan. Bigger attack, almost always Draw 2 on play, doesn’t require reduced hand size. I expect this to see a lot of play.

Vegeta, Explosion of Fury

Once again Bandai seeing how far we’ll go for a 1 Drop 15K. This is also decent with the Bulma SR which can get it back as needed but I don’t see it making the cut. We have a free 15K Blocker that often doesn’t see play so I don’t see this one getting much play either especially in a crowded 1 Drop spot.

Vegeta, the Sweet-Talker

Yeah, 1 Drop Barrier Blocker (in Bulma) isn’t really all that helpful unless you’re terrified of Crisis Crusher. This is pretty much a hard skip other than for the artwork.

Gotenks, the Unpredictable

This is close to Miscellaneous but it does enough with Bulma to make this section. More looting abilities and even has Dual Attack if you have a R/Y Land. My biggest gripe is needing to be played from hand to get any effect. I understand needing it for Dual Attack, but is it really all that important to lock looting behind it? Because of that, don’t think he ultimately makes the cut.

SS Vegeta, Raging Frenzy

If you’re gonna play any (well, new) Vegeta with Bulma it’ll be this one and it’s easy to see why. Any time a Bulma dies (not particularly hard when you’re giving them all Blocker), this just gets to come out for free. We greatly enjoy free 20K Double Strike bodies, especially when it’s also a very necessary R/Y card for potential Energy. Helps put on the pressure and even further makes it so the opponent will be uneasy swinging into your Blockers. Good stuff.

Super Baby 1/Super Baby 2, Awakened Malevolence

It seems Yellow’s theme is Reckless Swinging because once again we have a Leader going balls to the wall. This one isn’t set up nearly as a “One Shot Kill” as Goku/Pan but it has similar beats. Once again a Take 2 Life Leader which is rough, though at least he Awakens at 4 instead of 2. All of this to get a search. You do end up adding a ton of cards in hand by the end of the day. Optimal Awakening at 4 puts you up 8 cards which is obviously extremely good and will make up for the lack of inherent card advantage on his Awakened Side

On his Awakened Side he’s one of the few Leaders (though Bulma joins him this set) with 10K Power which is always a risk. Unlike most in his position he does not make up for it in any defensive way. Nope instead it’s to try and counteract his attacking ability. If you can turn his Triple Attack on, his 10K Power won’t matter whatsoever and if you can pump him up with other modifiers we have potential. He can also board free cards which can be good, if the targets are good which we’ll get to later.

Baby seems to serve this weird in-between where he wants you to punch hard and fast before the lack of defensive power catches up to you, but he also provides value based effects which expect the game to go longer. Let’s be clear, he cannot win as a Value Leader, he just won’t last on the board nearly long enough for that to work. He has to win quickly so then the question becomes if the tools he’ll be given will allow him to do so.

Son Gohan, Brainwashed

We’re gonna start with the Brainwashed cards as they’ll be the biggest points of contention. If they aren’t good, Baby is gonna have a rough time. This…is a mediocre start. I mean, a free 20K Body is pretty solid for sure but that’s pretty much all he is. The hope is that he’s just the one extra poke or so to push the opponent over. But he’s pretty much only decent when played for free.

Son Goten, Brainwashed

This is good if you have actual KO synergy in your deck that can pop him off. If you don’t he’s horrible. Relies too much on the opponent to make him decent. Most opponents aren’t gonna kill a 10K and allow a bigger guy to come out.

Trunks, Brainwashed

First, credit to Bandai for realizing that this would cause problems with Chain Attack Trunks. This card can represent two swings which is nice as long as you have the right Baby to help but again isn’t too spectacular on his own.

Bulma, Brainwashed

Uh yeah, sure to help smooth out the hands early game but hopefully something you’re never playing for free with Super Baby 2.

Bulla, Brainwashed

We like free Blockers. We like free Blockers that replace themselves. What we don’t like is free Blockers that are only free by taking up an extremely valuable ability to do so. She’s not good unless you cast her for free. If you cast her for free, that’s a move that could’ve been used elsewhere. She’s marginally better than Goten though on account she can actually trigger at least.

Blutz Wave Generator

Uh, yeah it’s a free searcher. They tend to be pretty damn good. While it’s not Successor of Hope good, that’s fine. This will work just fine for any Baby deck running Yellow.

Baby, Evil Origins

Gonna go to this one next because a few of the new cards basically refer to this one. Nearly anyone who read this with even a cursory Yu-Gi-Oh background knows what this card is. It’s Graceful Charity, one of the strongest cards in that game’s history. Now the ability isn’t nearly as absurd here for a multitude of reasons but even with no synergies it offers a supreme amount of card selection and filtering at a very cheap cost. This isn’t the basis of the deck mind you, but it should make it much easier to pilot. The only downside is that you can’t play this Turn 1…or can you?

Dr. Myuu, the Mastermind

This is pretty simple. Play down a R/Y Tap Land, play this for free, play the above Baby for free and enjoy your immense value. We like free cards, we like free value, this card is just all around great for the deck.

Baby, the Overseer

We aren’t done with the free value however. Once you’re done getting that going you can sack the Baby to play this for free. Yes it’s a Vanilla 10K, but this sets up potential chains and also clears the board so you can play another Evil Origins later.

Baby Vegeta, an Unfair Choice

This card is pretty independently good. In most cases he just gets to kill anything he wants. Keep in mind, this card is NOT Once Per Turn so at worst it’s two cards out of your hand to kill anything without Indestructible but in most cases it’ll only cost one. He can tap down potential blockers as well and he can do this as long as he’s on the board in the Main Phase. Forget being part of Baby or Machine Mutants, I can see a future for this card as a generic card.

Baby, Vengeful Upheaval

Now to start the new Baby Chain. This one is pretty simple, put this over top of the Overseer, Union-Absorb and you’re off. Now the upside to this is that he does get his choice of two. you can either go to the above Baby and just stop right there, or go into Super Baby 1 to keep going up the chain. Choices are good, we like choices. A cheap to put in play and a cheap Union-Absorb so I’d say he checks most of the boxes for a chain pivot.

Super Baby 1, All-Consuming Terror

This card gives you more of an actual reason to run the Brainwashed cards than the cards themselves do. Upsides to this are that he can be cheated out either by Baby Chain, or by simply using Arrival. Chain requires more cards but can grab from Deck, this you need in hand but is relatively self-serving. It’s just a matter of whether it’s worth the trouble in the end unless you want to use this to pair with the previous Baby Chain. Let’s find out.

Super Baby 2, Malicious Majesty

Here he is, the man himself and he’s impressive at a first glance. Deflect and Offering provide even more card advantage, along with a beefy 30K body which is pretty good even if played raw on 5 though it doesn’t come with any offensive keywords. But it’s all about that ability. A hefty price must be paid but it ultimately both board wipes, lowers the Leader power (which turns on SB2’s Triple Attack), negates the abilities of anything left standing AND does this at Activate:Battle speed. Yes, this ability is absolute worth the price due to its insane power level and flexibility.

Now to discuss the finer context of this card. Within the Baby deck itself its main use is of course, as an enabler for your Leader. To that respect he’s actually not that great ironically BECAUSE of his Activate: Battle ability. See, unless you have an already established field of some type before dropping this, that means you basically have to get this ability off on his swing…which means a single negate leaves your Leader out in the cold (if you try to use this on Leader swing you will already have missed your window to untap with Triple Attack). That makes him somewhat cumbersome to use in the deck, though still very necessary considering how difficult it is to get the opponent’s Leader to 0 Power otherwise.

This card’s strength will be in other strategies. The obvious choice unless a certain card is hit, is a Shenron strategy. Deck has (generally) a high life total, a ton of card advantage and of course has World Peace to cheat him out for free which will have him all but lockdown turns while applying pressure. If they try to kill him, World Peace just brings him back and don’t forget Offering triggering every time he hits the board. Otherwise, I could see any R/Y strategy using this card because he’s generally very easy to use and the ability is very powerful.

Giant Ape Baby, the Ultimate Evil Lifeform

Compared to the last Great Ape Baby we got…this card is just nothing. Never Evolve over the above Baby, you’re just downgrading cards at that point. Its main use will be in the Starter Deck, to be played over that 5 Drop SB2 since it doesn’t have a useful ability past its PiP ability. But in general this card isn’t very good. Either pay the two extra energy for Epochal Grudge or just don’t bother.

Baby, Vengeful Blow

This is basically the insurance policy for either Malicious Majesty, or for Epochal Grudge. They kill them, you play this and then go right back into them. It’s not bad, the only downside really being that in most cases you’ll be playing this on the opponent’s turn so they can just potentially kill this too before you get the chance but that seems relatively fair. I can see this being teched.

Flaming Death Ball

…Because Bandai wanted to print a new Revenge Death Ball without actually using the turn Revenge Death Ball, here we go. It’s pretty similar to the original with only a slight offshoot. You give up -5K Power to have the option to give one of your Battle Cards +10K for the turn. Is the trade-off worth it? Actually it might be. It’s far more useful offensively than RDB ever was and RDB lost a fair bit of its luster as we’ve printed more and more ways to interact potentially remove threats at instant speed, something that used to be at a premium when RDB was first printed. If nothing else it’s worth testing.

Miscellaneous Cards

SS3 Goku, One Hit Wonder

Random note I actually just noticed now, a Goku card that doesn’t say “Son Goku” (though the character name is still as such). Pretty interesting considering we have SS3 Son Goku in the same set. Anyway, this card seems like more of a Baby card than anything ironically enough. You can put him play for free off of a Planet M-2 which is pretty nice and acts like a free 15K Body. Then in the Drop he’s a clutch -5K when needed which could also trigger another one of these in hand. Could be some value to this card.

Son Gohan, Determined Training

This is a Limited card to me. The Red 2 Drop slot, especially in tempo decks is just so loaded that it’s going to be hard to really find room for him in my opinion unless on a Self-Mill strategy. Could see him being tried out though.

Chi-Chi, Motherly Majesty

Bandai showing that it’s not forgetting the previous color combinations brings us to Chi-Chi. Probably useless in Limited for this set, but whew this is one hell of a card for Red/Green decks. 2+ R/G Lands mean Chi-Chi turns into a mini-Super Combo which is just absurd. Instant 4-of Staple in any heavy R/G deck. Card is fantastic.

Dependable Warrior Piccolo : Shu, on the Offensive

We’re at the point where generic Super Combos are skips.

Potent Techinque Vegeta

Hey, the return of Bodyguards! Again, showing some love to the other color combos, U/Y gets itself a new and upgraded Bodyguard. Unlike the old school ones, this one comes out untapped and even is a Blocker which provides heightened defensive utility essentially fading two attacks. Not as great on offense but also not particularly the point. Could see this getting play depending on the strategy.

Trunks, Saiyan Majesty

Bandai just couldn’t last not supporting tap down strategies. But honestly this one is actually fantastic support. Provides enabling and payoff at the same time, both good. Filtering him to draw after a tap is nice, and also sets him up to tap things down at instant speed which is fantastic. Just having him in the Drop can completely wreck Dual/Triple Attack strategies or just in general hurt attack sequencing. I could see this getting niche play.

Mr. Buu

Skip!

Mai, a Sudden Encounter

So fun fact, there are seven 4 Drop Targets alone for this card, not taking into account anything lower. Not all of them are great being played in Rest Mode, but I’d wager at least half of them (with one very obvious target) are solid enough. …Yeah I can see this card getting played quite easily.

Bingo Tournament Grand Prize

Uh, yeah sure we’ll take some Dragon Ball recycling and tutoring on defense. Not a ton of decks get use out it but it wouldn’t shock me to see this card get some niche play in Kidku strategies if not more.

Return of Planet Tuffle

I’m making this short. Darkness Eye Beam exists. It doesn’t see play. A worse version will see less than zero play (don’t care that it can be played for free, that’s a waste of a Wish).

Super Galick Gun

Are you willing to have a dead Crusher Ball for the first half of the game just to potentially have a free Crusher Ball later in the game? I was going to write it off completely but I guess there may be a matchup or two where you really wish you had a free one so I can see it getting Sideboard play.

Final Thoughts:

The Red Leaders I’m pretty high on. Beerus is a good, solid generic Leader who should be able to manage a few different functions while Bulma is just fantastic in general even taking into account her lower power. The Yellow Leaders on the other hand…I’m not fond of. Feel like Goku/Pan is another one trick pony and Baby is more rigid than he really should be and if not for the necessity of needing a Yellow Baby Leader, the originals would be the better play. However there are a lot of individually good cards so even if the Leaders falter I think we’ll have a lot of good stuff to play around with.