With three sets under their belt and 1 currently being revealed, Bushi is getting clans out very fast, and with the quality of most of the cards they are printing, that is a good thing. People are getting their favorite clans fast and the deck are better than most people would expect. But just how healthy is the meta right now?

Here I will go into the state of all 7 clans released in ENG and touch on the 3 clans that are JP only. The following will be based mostly on tournament results. I will add my opinion towards the end of the article. These will not include what makes the decks good like their cards and mechanics. There will be a separate article for that soon in the future. This is solely focusing on the state of the meta, meaning representation in tournaments, tournament tops, and the trends both of those show in terms of viability. Now lets dive into it!

Oracle Think Tank:

One of the first 4 clans release d in standard format, OTT has shown a strong presence since they first dropped and have shown 0 signs of slowing down for anyone. Their representation tournaments is very high compared to the other clans, sitting at 11 players in the latest large tournament of 72 that took place after VEB-02 released in JP, a whole 15 percent of the entire distribution. That was only matched by Aqua Force and surpassed by Granblue, at 12. And their representation always hovers around that area. Yes, as more sets come around their representation numbers come down as people move to their favorite decks, but their tops aren’t lowering at all. In the same tournament, out of 72 people and 15% of the representation, they placed FIRST! And the tournament was structured differently than usual as well, as after 4 rounds of swiss there was a round robin through top 5. This means to place first, it had to get the best score by beating all 5 other players. That is just an idea of what OTT can do, has been doing, and what they can continue to do. Since VEB-01 was released in Japan, there have been 8 VGCS events or larger scale tournaments(anything not standard locals), 3 singles and 5 teams. OTT has had placed first twice, second once, and third twice out of the 3 singles events. In teams, they have been in a first place team 3 times, second place team 3 times, third place team twice, and a 4th place team twice, multiple of those events had OTT in at least 3 of the 4 top 4 teams. And the train isn’t stopping for anyone.

Kagero:

Main character deck number 2, Kagero has also shown a strong showing ever since they

were released. But once the deck with the most representation and tops, they have

slowly lost representation as more decks have come out. And unlike Oracle Think Tank, their success has actually started to slightly drop as a result, albeit not by a lot. At the end of VBT-01, they had 38% of the representation in a 68 player singles VGCS event and got all of first, second, and fourth place. They were doing very well for themselves. But come VEB-01 introducing Tachikaze, Spike Brothers, and Megacolony, and things began to fall. In the first VGCS during that era, in a 40 team 120 player tournament, they had 24% of the representation, still being the most represented deck in the tournament. In terms of tops, Kagero was in all 4 top 4 teams. Int he first singles tournament in that era, they had 17 out of 54 players, being the most represented still at 31%, but only placed fourth in top 4 and 3 more times in fifth through eighth they had 3 more tops. But now with that meta over and entering VEB-02 era, their representation, in teams at least because no more big singles events since, they were no longer the most represented clan sitting at 25%, being overtaken by OTT, but were still in every winning team in top 4. Their representation and viability is still very high, but as time goes on, things might change and representation may continue to drop. But it seems for now they are very stable around a quarter of people playing and a very good amount of tops.

Royal Paladins:

Royals are weird. They have been seen as one of the under dogs since the start of standard format, which is funny because you’d think Bushiroad would have treated their poster boy’s deck much better. Their representation has even shown, as in the beginning they were only the third most represented clan(granted there were only 4 clans). At the end of VEB-01 meta, they were still third most represented, but only placed in 1 top 4 deck out of all 4 teams. Now with Japan having access to VEB-02 introducing Granblue, Dimension Police, and Aqua Force, they went down to 6th most represented deck at only 7 out of 72 players, but were still able to reach top 5, but only 1 RP deck made it in. SO as the data shows, while Royal’s rep may be decently high compared to some other clans, their success rate is very low compared to said same tournaments. And it seems that it can really only drop from here.

Nova Grapplers:

Novas are quite easily one of the worst clans in the game so far, but has very recently proven themselves to not be worst. Second to worst, maybe even third, but hey anything is better than last place right? Ever since their release in standard, they consistently had the least amount of tops and amount people playing them. They started off with 9 players out of 68 players in the first singles event and 0 tops consistently throughout their time span. But they started to surprise people. Towards the end of VEB-01 Destructive Roar meta, some lists began to pop up. Special lists. Made for one sole purpose; KILL ORACLES!!! With the introduction to Queen of Hearts and King of Swords in their promos, possibilities arose and they began to top a couple times. Not often, and their representation tended to stay the same, their tops made them not the worst clan in the game(for now). In the first VEB-02 event, they only had 2 players use them out of 72 and didn’t get in top 5, but who knows what may be in store as it seems their dedicated fanbase is still in the lab making some new potions for success.

Tachikaze:

Tachikaze is possibly my favorite clan so far out of standard, and thankfully they stomped their way into standard trampling many others under their feet. Currently, they have been out for a month, and the deck has been in many teams and has a lot of tournament success since release. But as time goes on, their usage has been decreasing and their visibility in top 8s have been dwindling as a result. At the start of their release, they had 26 teams using them out of 40, the second most usage after Oracle Think Tank. Despite their high usage, they only made it into third and fourth place. But later, during the first big singles event, they only had 7 players using them out of 54, a measly 12% of the players out of 7 decks. And as a result, they did not get into top 8. Tachikaze continued to have good success in team events, but their representation rate has continued to decrease severely. Singles events have affected this, but in teams they still appear on many top 4 squads. In the most recent singles event, they only had 8 out of 72 players representing the clan, and none of them made it into top 5. They started off strong, but they may soon go extinct as more clans come out and pass them in power.

Spike Brothers:

Spikes, like tachikaze, started off strong when they released. Their first tournament had 12 out of 40 teams representing the clan making them the 5th most represented clan in the tournament. Despite this, they made it onto the teams for first and second place. In their first singles event, they had 6 out of 54 players using them, but sadly none of them reached top 8. But luckily in future team tournaments they continued to do well for themselves with more and more tops. But their singles luck turned around drastically come the next singles tournament at the beginning of VEB-02, where out of 72 players, only 6 were playing the clan, making a whopping 8% of decks out of 10 clans. Besides this, they manages to not only make it into top 5, but they placed in SECOND PLACE! Only behind OTT. The future is looking bright for out buff bloodball bois.

Megacolony:

During reveal season, Megacolony was thought to possibly be a strong contender for tier 1. But as the decks rolled out and tournaments began, it was quickly realized that the deck was very lackluster and underwhelming. Usage has been very low from the very beginning and tops have been as well. With very few tops it is looking like they may be one of, if not the worst, deck in the first wave of the series. In their first solo event of 54 players, they had 2 players, and 1 8th place top. Not too bad right? Right? Well it gets much, much worse. Their latest singles event of 72 players had, again, 2 players, and weren’t even close to top 5. Teams isnt doing well either, with them starting at 5 out of 40 teams and 0 tops to 8 players out of 30 and 1 4th place top to 7 out of 53 teams and 0 tops. As become evident, Megas seem to be doing very poorly and its not looking like

they will do any better anytime soon.

Granblue:

Being one of the three decks just released almost a week ago in Japan, there is very little data on the clan as a whole at the time of writing this. Only 1 tournament has been held so far, but luckily it was a very large one with 72 players. In it, 12 players were representing the clan making them the most represented clan in the event, and even made it to top 5, but only in third. So far, things aren’t looking bad for the undead pirates, but also no telling if they will rise much higher.

Aqua Force:

Aquas is the second clan released in the latest set, meaning, again, only 1 tournament to show what they can do. Not a lot of data, but we can make it work for now. In that event, they had 11 players out of the previously mentioned 72, making 15% of the players, tying with OTT. But they didn’t make top cut as none of those players made it into top 5. This may change as it seems Aqua Force is one of those clans that need quite a bit of lab work to become optimal, but as it stands right now, the skies are stormy for our pirate-killing men in white and blue.

Dimension Police:

The last of the VEB-02 clans dropped, they are blah blah 1 tournament blah blah 72 players blah blah low data blah blah blah. They had 10 people using them in that tournament, so 13% of the event were bringing justice to the player hall. And not surprisingly unlike aquas they managed to make it into top 5 with 4th place. Not too bad, but I want to see just how far they can go and how high their potential can reach.

These are the current trends for the 10 decks released so far. From the looks of it, The meta seems to be looking something like:

Tier 1:

OTT, KG, Tachi

Tier 2:

Royal Paladin, Spike Brothers, Granblue, Dimension Police

Tier 3:

Aqua Force, Megacolony, Nova Grapplers

But trends can change. Decks may arise where a low viability deck can have a great match-up and become a better deck. But as it stands now, this seems to be how things are looking. VEB-02 is just starting and it is currently reveal season for VBT-02, so I’m very interested to see how the next few months change the meta, and I hope you are as well.

I will also be uploading posts with each new non–locals tournament in the future, so look out for those as well.

Til next time.

This is Guzmada, signing off.